A Change of Constellation
by samurai-ashes
Summary: When Dean wakes up with all the wrong parts in all the right places, his primary concern is figuring out who stole his dick and how to get it back. In the mean time, he may as well try out the new equipment. If only he had ever paid attention in a seventh-grade health class, he could have avoided the complications that came next. [Dean/Cas, genderbending, mpreg]
1. Chapter 1

**Notes/Warnings: Sorry to throw these here, but since lacks a proper warnings section, this story contains: _temporary genderbending, M/F sex, mpreg, mentioned drug use & alcoholism, internalized homophobia & sexism, & minor body horror._** This was written for the **Dean/Cas Big Bang (2012)**, and I highly recommend checking the community out. There are so many great writers and artists particpating, and more to come throughout the month! Thanks to** jay_kateel & gwendy** for all their hard work. :D

* * *

**Chapter One**

Dean has a love-hate relationship with mornings during a hunt. On one hand, he hates getting too little sleep and waking up sore. The beds are never right, and everything always smells old and used.

On the other hand, it reminds him of growing up, like sharing Lucky Charms with Sam on Saturday mornings. And honestly, there's nothing like the days-long adrenaline high of the hunt, or the feel of the Impala as they break the speed limit across state lines. With things quiet in the past year, he's missed that.

So when the sun hits him in the face and he catches that first scent of musty cheap hotel, he smiles as he stretches. His whole body feels about two sizes two small; every muscle tight and aching. He considers risking a bath in the questionable hotel tub when he stretches his arms above his head and opens his eyes.

"The fuck!"

Sam is a credit to his years on the job; he's upright with his knife in hand before he's actually awake. When it becomes apparent that they're alone in the room, he drops the knife on the pillow and rubs his eyes. "What?"

"I thought we were over this stupid prank war shit - how did you - " Dean clears his throat, his voice too high and husky. He sits up, and his whole chest bounces with him. There isn't close to enough air in the world to fill his lungs as he inhales and exhales at roughly the speed of sound. He shoves his hands under his shirt to remove the offending fake breasts - "Oh my god." He leaps out of bed and yanks his shirt off as he stands in front of the mirror.

"Um, Dean? What?" Sam clearly has nerves of steel, which Dean admires right now because _what the fuck?_ "Are you - " Sam looks to the bed, then back to where Dean stands topless in front of the mirror. "What?"

Dean runs his hands down over a chest that's significantly more voluptuous than it was last night, before yanking his hands away and shaking them as though he can somehow will them away by sheer force. He squints his eyes shut - _please be a dream please be a dream this cannot be happening_ - but when he looks in the mirror, they're still there.

Boobs.

Hesitating, moving like he's about to reach his hand into a lion's mouth, he checks down the front of his pants. He gags. "I'm going to be sick." He rushes to the bathroom while Sam stares and rubs the sleep crud out of his eyes.

While Dean pukes everything he's ever eaten, Sam makes his way about the room. Dean hears the hotel coffee maker gurgling between retches. When Sam reaches the doorway, he leans against the jamb and finally asks, "Do you have tits, Dean?"

"My dick is gone!" Dean gags again, but there's nothing left to lose - he's officially empty. He's still waiting to wake up. Is he being punished? Is someone fucking with him? He is going to - "Sam! Someone stole my dick!"

Sam huffs like he might laugh, but has the decency to look queasy. He brings Dean a glass of water. "Can you, um - " He clears his throat and looks at the ceiling. "Boobs, Dean. The boobs are weirding me out."

"They're weirding me out!" But Dean finds his t-shirt on the floor and tugs it on. He's quickly moving from horrified to utterly numb, and he checks again. Everything is firmly attached and _someone stole his dick._

Sam sits across from him, their knees nearly touching. It's quiet for a while, and Dean forces himself to breath slowly. He isn't going to do any good by panicking.

"So," Sam says after a beat. "Any clue why you're, um. A woman?"

Dean groans and drops his face into his hands. The coffee maker stutters to a stop; the coffee smells weak but Dean doesn't even care. He needs something to ground him, something normal. Coffee in the morning is normal.

He crosses the room to pour some into the foam cups provided by the hotel. "No clue. Sam, what - " No, that's enough of that. That's panicking. His stomach churns, but he forces himself to drink the coffee. One task at a time.

"Looks, it's obviously... Hm. Not the trickster." Sam reaches into the duffel and pulls out their dad's battered journal. It's been years since they'd needed to consult it seriously, but Sam looks pretty serious now that he's woken up. "Someone is fucking with us. No big deal. We'll make some calls. Garth probably knows someone - "

"Don't you dare!" The idea of _anyone_ knowing that he's suddenly got girl parts makes him want to crawl into a hole and die, least of all Garth - who would probably be infuriatingly cool with it.

"Well, I don't think Dad dedicated a chapter to 'dude looks like a lady'." Sam has another snorting fit that sounds like he's trying not to laugh, and Dean hates him so much. If Sam woke up like this, he wouldn't... Okay, he would. He totally would. "What do you want to do?"

Dean scowls and his lips feel all wrong. His whole body feels totally wrong, and it gives him the creeps. "We'll call Cas, and he can help us find out what's going on here."

Sam raises an eyebrow. "Cas?"

"Yeah! Sure, Cas can find anyone."

"Except, you know, we haven't seen him since that whole... thing."

As though _thing_ adequately describes the way they parted ways, Castiel beaten and weak but eager to return to Heaven to survey the damage. He didn't look Dean in the eye; he just mumbled through his plans and left.

Sam claps his hands together, bringing Dean back into the here and now. "You sure you want to call now, just to ask for help?"

Except it's not like it's the first time Dean has called (and been ignored), but Sam doesn't know and doesn't need to know. "Look, it's not best case scenario, but I trust him - at least he doesn't really get the whole junk thing, right?" Dean bows his head and blows the slightly-too-long hair up from his eyes. For good measure, he presses his hands together in pantomime of prayer. "Castiel, consider this one most urgent prayer from your favorite Dean Winchester."

Nothing.

Dean shifts in place and tries again. "Seriously. This is, like, life-changing, life-or-death sort of shit." Because Dean will kill himself if he can't get this figured out. No way he's going to go through the rest of his life as a woman.

No combination of pleading or swearing gets them an answer, and after the fifth attempt Dean throws his arms up in disgust. "Fuck it. I'm taking a shower - you come up with a better plan." He storms into the bathroom and slams the door.

With a sigh, Dean tries to get a good look at himself in the cloudy bathroom mirror. He's not even necessarily a hot chick, not really; if he saw himself in a bar he would file himself away as "Plan B." He looks - well, he looks more like a chick built using a dude's features. His hair is longer, but too short for his taste. He's not the sort of hourglass figure he usually admires. Instead, he's more solidly built, muscled like a chick who professionally kicks ass for a living.

Which, hey, it looks like he is a chick who kicks ass for a living.

Then again, he's got a rack and an ass that would turn heads.

And suddenly, it seems kind of wrong to look at himself and use words like "rack" and "ass." Shuddering, he turns away from the mirror and jumps into the shower.

* * *

After the world's most awkward shower, it can no longer be avoided - Dean has to leave the hotel room as a woman. For one, there's nothing eat and he is starving. He feels like he's run a marathon. How much energy does metamorphosis take?

"I hate this," he grumbles as he tries to fit into his own clothes. The button-downs won't close over his brand new tits right, and even his t-shirts seem designed to scream, _look at my boobs!_ His jeans are too loose in the waist and too tight in the thighs; there's nothing to do but cinch his belt and grit his teeth as he leaves the room.

To his surprise, the world doesn't explode. It's the same world it always was, and it looks exactly the same. The only thing different is him.

Sam sits beside him in the Impala and doesn't make a single comment while Dean changes the driver's seat and starts the car.

No one in the diner says anything. Apparently no one in the world can tell how wrong this is. When the waitress comes to their table, she smiles brightly at them. "Morning, darlings, what can I get you?"

Dean's stomach grumbles and his appetite gets the better of his discomfort. "Bacon and eggs. Side of sausage. Hash browns. Two sides of toast. And a cup of coffee."

The waitress laughs and pats Dean on the shoulder. "Good for you - my daughter is always going on and on about how she can't eat as much as she wants in front of her boyfriend."

Dean's going kill their waitress with a butter knife.

Sam finally laughs. He breaks down into great big peals of laughter that he's clearly been holding in all morning, and the waitress fixes him with a glare that could take the paint off a house.

"It's not you," Sam wheezes. "He - she's my..." He struggles to compose himself, but it's clear that it's going to be a tough morning. "Sister. Definitely not my girlfriend." After clearing his throat, he skims the menu. "Veggie omelet, please, and a glass of water."

The waitress brightens right back up. "Oh, I'm so sorry, kids. Got it, veggie omelet. I'll have that coffee right out." She heads off to the kitchen, and Dean thumps his forehead against the table while Sam, still snickering, pulls out his laptop.

"Can you stop finding this so funny?" Dean snaps, sitting up once the waitress brings out the coffee and Sam's water. He sips his coffee black while Sam takes deep breaths to calm his chuckles. "Alright, that's enough. What's the plan?"

"Well, the hunt must go on," Sam finally says. "Looks like you were right about Elma Mooney. New in town, murders started right after she moved - starting with her next door neighbor. Definitely looking to be our ghoul."

"Good, great, let's kill the bitch and get the fuck out of Virginia Beach." Dean didn't mean to be so cavalier about the whole thing. It's just that he has a special place in his heart for killing ghouls after how they put Adam right on angel radar; not to mention that the longer she lived, the more innocent people their new ghoul could kill. "I'm ready to go home and never leave the basement."

Sam gives him a curious look, before clearing his throat and nodding. "Right. Head shot. Should be a piece of cake."

Once they've finished eating and paid their check, Dean gets their gear in order. They ought not to load the shotguns in the diner parking lot, but Dean wants to get this over with quickly.

Every movement is less efficient. He's got a whole life of useless muscle memory, and that just makes him want to shoot something more. He tosses the guns in the back seat and climbs in the Impala. Mooney's house is out in a subdivision, but the drive isn't far. "You think she's still got the missing woman alive?"

Sam shudders and rubs his forearms as though absently remembering what it was like to bleed out. "If she's in the mood to play with her food, maybe - but I wouldn't count on it."

"Fair enough."

They park two houses down and scout the area before determining that the coast is clear. Broad daylight is stupid; some bored housewife is bound to look out her window and notice two guys (a guy and a chick, _shit_) skirting around the back of Mooney's McMansion with sawed off shotguns.

They crouch by the back door. "I'll go in first," Sam says. "We'll head downstairs, see if she might be stashing anyone in the basement."

"No can do; big brother goes first." Dean shoulders past him to the front door. He starts to protest, and Dean snaps, "I've got this."

The back door opens easily, the house eerily quiet. The first two doors they try are a closet and a pantry respectively. The third leads down a set of stairs, into a dark basement. There's no noise, no sign of life, and Dean recognizes the vague scent of decay as it wafts up the stairs. He takes the stairs quickly, quietly, but he damn near stumbles over his feet on the way down.

"Well," Sam says behind him, sounding vaguely sick as he surveys the body count on the concrete floor. "I think we've got our ghoul." They do a cursory check, but there's clearly no survivors.

They're halfway up the stairs when they hear the front door open and shut. Someone whistles loudly and off-key, and Dean readies his shotgun. When Mooney turns the corner, just as she sees them standing there, he pulls the trigger.

Except his height is wrong and his aim is off - what should have hit her right in the face instead rips through her shoulder. She staggers for just a second before rushing down the stairs, horribly fast. Dean throws himself at her before she can knock both him and Sam down the stairs. Sam flattens himself against the rail as Dean and Mooney go down in a tangle of limbs. "Sam!"

"I can't get the shot!"

Mooney, or the ghoul wearing an impressive Elma Mooney costume, gets the better of Dean, her arm wrapped tight around his neck and wrenching him in front of her as a human shield. She ducks her face into the crook of his neck, behind the protection of his head.

Sam made his way up higher on the stairs; his gun is clearly pointed at them, but Dean can't see Sam's face against the light behind him.

Dean struggles, but his body isn't cooperating like usual. Isn't not a strength thing, but a size thing; his arms and legs are just a little off, and his whole balance is fucked up. Not to mention that the ghoul has a grip like a fucking vice.

"You," Mooney hisses against his skin, "are just my type." She whips her head up unnaturally fast and shouts at Sam, "Back out slowly and I'll only kill the one!"

"Oh, the fuck you will." Dean manages to lever his feet against a step and launches them back into the wall. Mooney hits the stone and her grip loosens, just a second, just enough. Dean ducks out of her arms. "Now!"

The shotgun blasts, and Dean's ears ring. He warm blood splatters on the back of his neck, and he glances over his shoulder to see Mooney fall dead. He sighs in relief and takes the stairs up two at a time. They've got maybe five minutes before the cops arrive - gunshots don't go over well in these nice neighborhoods, especially two of them.

They're in the car and on their way back to the hotel room when Sam finally speaks. "You said you wanted to go home."

Dean scratches the back of his neck; his fingers come back sticky and red, and he wipes them on his jeans. "Yeah, I want to get somewhere familiar."

"You've never called it home."

"Oh for the love of - is this _really_ the right time for this?" Dean shakes his head and drives resolutely at the speed limit.

Sam snorts, but doesn't press the issue further.

* * *

The house is Sioux Falls is too quiet without Bobby around; every time they walk in, Dean feels like an intruder. It was just - it was too sudden. He had a good death, a Hunter's death, but the ache still hits Dean like they lost their dad a second time. Sam's progress with organizing the books in Bobby's office still feels wrong; as usual, he heads right for the books.

He drops their bags in the hallway and tries another silent prayer to Castiel. _Please don't ignore me this time. I really need a hand here, and there's no one else in the world I trust._

Continued radio silence. Dean tries not to let his disappoint show.

"You think Bobby's going to have something there on this?" Dean asks.

"If anyone did, it's Bobby. Where to start...?"

Dean leaves him to it while he heads upstairs to his room. It might be weeks before another hunt, unless they count the mad dash to find Dean's penis as a hunt. Which he does. Possibly the most important hunt he's ever undertaken.

He's is in the middle of contemplating his dirty laundry pile when he hears a familiar noise on the edge of his hearing, a rustle that makes his whole body go rigid with mixed apprehension and hope. He stands perfectly still, and then he hears Sam shout, "Cas!"

Dean rushes downstairs, determined to remain composed, when Castiel replies, "I came as soon as I could. Is everything okay? I'm under the impression - "

"Cas, what took you so long?" Dean snaps, even though he meant to say something like, _Thank you, I had no idea what we'd do if you didn't come._

Castiel turns and stumbles back as though Dean took a swing at him, his face contorted in clear shock and horror.

Shaking his head, he takes a step closer and stares like he's looking right under Dean's skin. Then again, he might be. He moves in too close, like the old days, but it's... off. Some things are the same: the messy hair, the strange-and-comforting smell of ozone, and even the rumbled overcoat. But under it he's wearing regular street clothes, and there's dark circles under his eyes. He looks almost sickly.

"Oh," he finally says. He's gained control over his expression again, but he stands further away than usual. "Someone has twisted your form. This is most troubling."

"No shit." Dean slumps down on the couch. "Can you fix it?"

Castiel looks from Sam to Dean. "No. I don't - I can't. I'm sorry."

"Hey, it's fine," Sam says; he pats Castiel's shoulder, and Dean wants to smack his hand away. It's not the first time that impulse has hit, and he ignores it like he usually does. With that whole raised-you-from-perdition rerun, Dean has no claim on Castiel that Sam doesn't share. (He refuses to admit what a bitter pill that is to swallow sometimes, discovering his best friend likes them both equally.) "I don't suppose you can point us in the right direction, at least. We don't even know how it happened."

"Of course." Castiel stands at the edge of the room like he's unsure whether he's going to run away or join them as Sam heads back to the books. "There's rage in the magic," he adds.

Dean tilts his head; his hair falls in his eyes again, and he shoves it back too hard; it pulls at his scalp. "Rage?"

Castiel crosses his arms over his chest and nods. "A jilted witch, I think."

They all share a moment of awed silence for a moment, before Sam sighs and drops his head, his hand flat on the cover of the book he was about to open.

Dean jumps to his feet and starts pacing. "Fuckin' witches, man!"

Sam doesn't even look up. "That would seem to be the problem, yes."

"Damn it, Sam, you know what I mean!" Dean gets in Castiel's space, and is glad that he hasn't been made shorter as well. "You're positive? It's definitely a - I mean, I would have known if I banged a witch, right?"

Castiel's eyebrows twitch just so. He stuffs his hands into the pockets of his overcoat; the motion makes him seem hunched. "Apparently not."

"Okay, look, this can happen - it's not like you're the first person in the world a witch has..." Sam snorts and puts a hand over his mouth. He takes a deep breath before he says it: "Genderbent. It's fixable." He smiles at Castiel like they're both in on some hilarious joke, and Dean wants to punch them both in their stupid fucking faces. "We find the witch and get her to reverse it, right?"

Castiel nods, his expression something between serious and utterly lost. "That seems right."

"Great! Dean, who did you sleep with in Virginia Beach?"

"No one! I mean, don't get me wrong, but it's been a bit dry here, if you know what I mean."

Castiel's expression is the very definition of _I don't know what you mean._

Sam, however, clearly does. "Well, which towns _did_ you jilt women in?"

Dean counts on his fingers, and runs out of fingers sooner than he'd like. "We had the werewolves in Tacoma last month," he mumbles, "and I just sort of started the tour there."

"Seriously Dean? You can't - no, never mind."

Sulking again, Dean heads to the couch and settles back into self-pity mode. A witch. How could he have not noticed a witch? He hates witches! Every time he's near one his creep radar goes off, and typically it doesn't end in a boner. Marcy, maybe? She had been into some weird stuff, or maybe the one whose name started with a K or a C -

"I can devise a... radar of sorts," Castiel says. He looks around the room before taking a red piece of twine from where it marked the place in a book on a nearby end table. He kneels in front of Dean and wraps the cord three times around Dean's wrist before tying it. He mumbles something, and it briefly flashes hot against Dean's skin. "There. It will react to your witch's magic when you're near - the closer you get, the hotter it will become. It should help."

Dean's heart beats too fast, and he can't look away. Castiel stares up at him curiously, still holding Dean's wrist between his forefinger and thumb. _Don't do anything stupid, Dean._

When Dean clears his throat, Castiel stands as if commanded. "That easy, huh?" Dean's voice is too low. He swallows the nervousness bubbling up in his chest, and turns his focus to the twine on his wrist.

"It's powered by the magic that holds your form in place," Castiel says. He doesn't sound so steady himself, and he still looks uncomfortable. "I have to go. If I come to know anything, I'll let you know." Before Dean can protest, Castiel is gone. He stares at the twine on his wrist, then looks up at Sam.

"I was just ready to stay settled for a while, too," Sam says. "At least we're still packed."


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

First they head east. "Let's go recent before we go back," Sam had said when they packed the car. Dean's last conquest before they hit the ghoul in Virginia Beach was in Charlottesville. Determined, Sam decided they'd drive the full twenty-one hours in one go, as quickly as possible. "Searching the country for the witch that diddled your boy parts isn't my idea of a good time," he said at two AM in a McDonald's drive-thru.

"Well, I still don't think Charlottesville is the witch. She's a college senior. Erica or something like that." He folds his arms under his breasts. He's almost adjusted to them, started to work out to the differences in balance and strength in his brand new body, but it's still weird. Other than the necessary tasks, he's been ignoring his...

He can't even fucking say it.

"Classy," Sam mutters. He uses one hand to steer while he drinks his Coke. "Do you know where to find her?"

"Um, yes." Dean smiles sheepishly at the memory. She'd had curly dark hair and a fresh tribal tattoo on her lower back, the ink still shiny. "I drove her home from the bar, and we parked in her parent's driveway."

"You are a scourge on the fathers of America."

Dean smirks. "Don't I know it."

* * *

They make a quick drive by Erica-or-something-like-that's house, but there's nothing. No residual burn. Not even a little tingle. Dean stares at the twine on his wrist. A weird lump clogs his throat when he looks at it that won't go away.

It's always gone away before, that strange and noisy feeling that he refuses to consider. He doesn't have time for it now, when he's trying to remember the last women he bedded.

"Well, worth a shot," Sam says. "Let's get a hotel; we can start heading west tomorrow." He finds the first roadside motel on the way out of town and checks in alone. Dean takes the opportunity to stretch; he relishes the cool summer air and took a swig from the flask in his jacket pocket. The jacket hangs weird on his frame, but he likes to imagine he looks more like an awesome punk chick and less like someone borrowing her brother's ill-fitting coat.

When Sam returns, he has two keys.

"What the hell?" Dean asks as he hands over one key.

"Look, I figure you're about two beers away from some uncomfortable self-exploration, and I just - I'd rather not know that much about you."

"It's not like - "

"Nope, totally different. It's no big deal, really. Just - " A shudder passes through him, as though he's imagined something unpleasant. Like having his nails pulled out or being shot or something. "Never tell me about it."

The idea doesn't sound at all appealing. Dean fancies that he knows exactly how to work a woman, and it's a lot of pressure to test that theory on himself. Still, it's not like he hasn't gotten selfishly used to having his own room in the quiet weeks when they work the salvage yard between hunts. "Fine. Whatever. Call me in the morning." He sets off for his own room and immediately drops back onto the bed. It's too soft, and he squirms to get comfortable with no luck.

It's too quiet. He flips through the seven grainy television stations and finds only news and sitcom reruns. There's a small paper tucked into one drawer, right beside the customary Gideon, advertising which channel to find the pay-per-view porn on.

Dean isn't tired, but he doesn't want to bother Sam. His old standby of heading out to the bar for a good lay is out of the question. He wouldn't even know where to start.

He blows out a breath and flips through his phone. He could send Sam annoying text messages. Maybe even Garth, for shits and giggles. He still has Castiel's old phone number programed in. He's called it before; it rings and still has that stupid voicemail greeting programed it. He wonders if Castiel ever checks it.

Shaking his head, Dean tosses the phone aside and decides to call it an early night. It's his turn to drive tomorrow. He strips down to his boxers, which leave irritating elastic marks over his hips, and turns out the lights.

Sleep eludes him. Sleep is something that is happening to other people, people whose minds aren't racing with witches and wrong sex organs and Sam's commentary weaving a niggling curiosity in the back his brain. He lays on his side, then rolls to his stomach. He counts sheep. He tries talking each of his body parts to sleep - he read about it in some old magazine as a kid.

Goodnight feet. Goodnight ankles. Goodnight calves. Goodnight knees. Goodnight thighs. Goodnight -

Dean flops onto his back. He has to, doesn't he? He's not going to be able to rest until he checks it out once and for all. Heaving a sigh, he spreads his legs and reaches a hand determinedly under the waistband of his boxers.

It's normal, from what he can tell, but unique to him. He shivers as he runs his fingers through his wiry curls and brushes the closed folds of his temporary pussy. He licks his lips, falling back on his favorite fantasy - that first weekend with Lisa - and feels out the familiar/unfamiliar territory.

He slides his middle finger inside to get it slick, his body opening in response as he moves to find the sensitive bundle of his clit. The twine brushes against his skin and his mind flashes to Castiel kneeling, Castiel's fingers as he tied the string to Dean's wrist. Dean's hips jerk slightly and his nipples harden and he _stops_, panic replacing arousal.

Oh.

It's normal, isn't it? That weird lump that won't go away when he thinks of Castiel - it's like when he had a crush on Bianca Pratt in eighth grade. He can't will it away, because now it's not too weird or impossible. Now he's... Well, not a _he_, at least not for the time being.

Somewhere in the back of Dean's mind, where reason has apparently forgotten that he's not actually a woman and that it's still impossible, there's hope.

He rolls back onto his stomach and counts sheep.

Sam doesn't ask.

Dean tortures him anyway. "So, this girl business isn't all bad," he says between large bites of his breakfast burrito. He waggles his eyebrows as he chews. "When I'm a guy again, I will be a literal sex god."

Sam's whole face contorts in horror. "Don't you think maybe this whole thing was designed to, I don't know, make you rethink your man-whore ways?"

Dean shrugs. _No shit, Sherlock._ "Don't know what the crazy bitch was thinking. I mean, we don't even know I jilted her."

Sam raises an eyebrow. "What, you don't believe Cas?"

"I believe him - but maybe I just killed her coven mate or something. It doesn't have to be about sex."

"Really." Sam looks pointedly down at Dean's boobs. "I'm pretty certain this is about sex."

Dean manages the last of his burrito in one big bite and chews with a not-quite-closed mouth, which is enough to make Sam look away. "Whatever, man," Dean says when he's got it mostly swallowed. "I'm just saying - there are some perks."

Sam doesn't voice any more thoughts over breakfast, and they spend the next twelve hours tracing their exact route from Charlottesville to Springfield, stopping in all the same towns to feel for some trace with their witch homing beacon.

By the time they're pulling in to a familiar motel in Springfield, Dean is half-asleep behind the wheel. He should have asked how close he needed to get. It's not as though he got work addresses from the women he fucked during a hunt. It's all supposed to be good fun - everyone was supposed to know that he wasn't sticking around.

He slams on the brakes.

Sam jerks to attention in the passenger seat. "What's wrong?"

"I think - " Dean rubs his face and swears. His back is killing him - boobs are not so fun to haul around. He's sweaty and needs a shower, and suddenly he remembers exactly which girl he jilted. "The yearly sabbatical to Las Vegas."

Sam's face falls. "Are you serious? We went the complete wrong way for Vegas, Dean!"

"I know, I know! But you were on that fucking nature thing, or whatever it is you do, and I was cruising this bar and... you know." When Sam continues to look unimpressed, Dean sighs. "Look, this makes it easy, right? Her name was..."

He licks his lips and stares off into space. He knew her name. After the second martini for her and beer on tap for him, they had wandered up to his hotel room. He distinctly remembered whispering her name - _Trust me, this is definitely something special..._

"You don't know her name, do you?"

"I did! I just... you know, I took the easy road that night."

Sam settles on an appraising glare that would have fit on their father's face.

Dean rolls his eyes. "You know - hey, I've never felt this way before. You're amazing. I think I love you. Of course I'll call."

"The douchebag road."

"It's not like I use it all the time! It was Vegas. Everyone lies in Vegas!" Dean cruises to a parking spot and climbs out of the car. "Let's check in, get a good night's sleep, and figure it out in the morning."

"Really, we'll figure out how to find a girl in Vegas, who may have been a tourist, who you can't remember?"

"Just go get the room. I'll meditate or something."

When Sam returns again with two keys, Dean doesn't bitch. It's nice not to fight over first rights to the shower. Standing under the blessedly hot spray of water, washing parts he'd never considered for more than fun, he realizes he's alienated he feels.

It's not just that his dick is still missing - he's adaptable, and he's determined already that it's all a temporary thing. He's going to get his dick back, and he can go back to being Manly Man Dean Winchester, scourge of fathers and boyfriends.

But his brother doesn't want to share a hotel room, and even Castiel looks at him like he's something just a little bit dirty. Every time some strange guy gives him a once-over, he wants to punch the motherfucker - and then wonders how many girls he'd creeped out with an up-and-down glance.

Once he's dry and comfortable in a shirt and a fresh pair of boxers, Dean considers his options. Try as he might, he can't remember a name. He vaguely recalls long dark hair and a lacy red bra and maybe B cups? She might have had blue eyes, or that might be Castiel encroaching on his thoughts again.

Come to think of it, maybe Castiel can help. Dean dials the number. It's not that he really wants to bother the angel, it's just that he wants to be able to say he asked for help.

He's so tired of asking Castiel for help. Dean isn't supposed to be a job, he's supposed to be a friend.

The phone is still ringing in Dean's ear when Castiel appears in the room. "What can I do?" he asks, standing nearly in the corner of the room. Even though he would never physically run, he's poised like he might be considering it. He doesn't even sound upset, just tired. There's a shiftiness to the way he moves, the way he glances around as though seeking all the exits.

"Hey, I didn't think - " Dean closes his phone, and clears his throat. "I think the witch is in Vegas. Any chance Angel Air is still open for business?" Dean isn't surprised when Castiel shakes his head, once and quick. "Long shot anyway. I remember being... Well, being a dick, but I can't remember her name. I don't even know if I got a name."

Castiel takes a hesitant step forward. "I can try to find the memory, if you like."

"Really?" Dean smiles. "Perfect. It's not going to hurt you, is it?"

"No." But Castiel moves carefully, only coming as close as necessary to brush his fingers to Dean's forehead.

_Laughter and her hair through his fingers as she tugs the bun loose, her squeal as he pops the buttons of her shirt. The name tag, hotel name emblazoned across the top, catches his eye -_

"Gemma." Castiel pulls his fingers away, his voice gone croaky all of a sudden. "Her name tag says Gemma." He turns like he's about to leave.

"Cas, wait."

Castiel freezes, and looks at Dean like he's been dreading those very words. It makes it worse.

Dean hasn't made amends for his role in what happened, the things he said that made it worse. He just wants it be solved - all he really wants is for Castiel to visit sometimes. He misses the way Castiel stood too close and misunderstood why it made Dean uncomfortable.

Dean swallows his pride. "Look, I'm sorry. I never said I was sorry, and I should have. You have every right to be pissed."

"I'm not upset. Why would you think I was?"

Dean laughs, clipped and sardonic. "I called and called, right? Now you're edging around me like I smell bad."

"Your form disturbs me."

"My - are you fucking serious?" Dean stalks toward Castiel with every intention of hitting him, his fists balled. "Look, I'm not in love with it but there's nothing wrong with it!"

Castiel holds his hands up, palms out; Dean stops just shy, his face hot.

"You misunderstand me. Again." Castiel's shoulders relax slightly, and he lowers his hands. "I crafted you from bone and earth. To breathe life and bond soul to a human body is something few angels experience. This form is something twisted. It hurts to behold, when I have loved your body for so long."

Dean's breath catches in his throat. He licks his lips. "Come on, Cas - you can't just tell a dude you love his body. That's a cheesy porno line. Besides, you can't..." His mouth has gone dry, and he can't quite muster a nonchalant smile because this can't happen.

Castiel frowns. "Was there some confusion about my feelings? I have loved you for a long time, Dean. I didn't realize that I was unclear."

"Um." Dean leans closer. He feels the warmth of Castiel's body, finds himself heady with his scent.

This is happening - oh shit, that bullet train left the station days ago and he's only just now realizing that this is going to happen. "Is this so bad?" His voice is low and quiet as he runs his hand up Castiel's arm.

Castiel seems dazed and distracted as Dean's hand comes to rest on the side of his neck. "It isn't yours."

"It is. I mean, it's all my skin, right?" Dean's whole body feels overexposed and _wanting_ and he needs Castiel to understand. His fingers brush the hair at the nape of Castiel's neck. "And this is... It's not weird like this."

Understanding dawns in Castiel's eyes. "You would be uncomfortable in your own body."

Dean doesn't bother to agree; he doesn't want to waste the time. He pulls Castiel in and kisses him, his whole body relaxing into one exulted moment of _finally._

Despite the unfamiliarity of the shapes - the fullness to his lips, the swell of his breasts between them - it works. Fucked up, definitely. He's not stupid; he's not really a woman, but for now it doesn't matter. When Castiel runs his hands down to the swell of Dean's ass and pulls him closer, Dean believes that he can have this one nice thing out of a shitty situation.

Castiel kisses him like he's letting loose years of something repressed and uncertain. Dean aches for more.

He shoves Castiel's stupid overcoat off without breaking the space between them; his fingers stumble over every button to Castiel's shirt . He grins and pulls back from the kiss to yank his own shirt up over his head.

Castiel stares, but not at Dean's breasts – he places a hand on Dean's cheek. Dean backs away and yanks him toward the bed by the waistband of his pants; he stumbles into a sitting position on the bed and undoes Castiel's fly.

"Dean."

Pausing, Dean looks up to Castiel's face. There's so much open affection there, and Dean almost can't stand it. He's doesn't want talking to ruin the moment. "Yeah?"

Castiel leans down to kiss him again. "I would desire you in any form," he whispers against Dean's lips.

That's it. Game won. Dean melts and yanks Castiel down onto the bed. He should say something equally poetic, something emotional and meaningful, but words - Castiel should know by now that Dean doesn't do words.

So instead Dean divests him of the rest of his clothing and admires the whole that is Castiel, magnificent and beautifully human against the maroon paisley bedspread. Twitchy and lust-heated himself, he shimmies awkwardly out of his boxers and sits up, one hand steadying himself on Castiel's hip.

They stare at each other. Dean is suddenly aware of his total nudity, the body that doesn't reflect him at all.

He wants his own body back. He's imagined this moment a dozen times, but never like this. He almost stops- almost says, Let's just rain-check it until we can do it for real.

Except he can't. He never would.

* * *

Castiel stays the night. His face is tense even in rest, and Dean is surprised to see him actually asleep. It's not the first time he's seen Castiel sleep, but it certainly seems more... practiced. For one, Castiel hogs the blankets. And snores.

Castiel rolls onto his back and blinks slowly before his eyes focus on Dean. He smiles. It's disconcertingly unfamiliar, with the shadow of stubble and the messiness of his hair. Goosebumps raise across Dean's neck. He hasn't thought about that husk of Castiel he saw in Zachariah's future in a long time, but for a moment Castiel looks too eerily similar.

Dean ignores Sam's first wake up call in the morning in favor of a less frantic fuck. It's still just once if they haven't left the bed yet.

"You should visit more often," Dean says some time afterward, breathless and tingling. Castiel raises an eyebrow at him, and he flushes. "Not like this. It's just me and Sam now, and if you're not pissed..."

The phone rings for a third time. It's becoming more and more evident that the real world needs attention. Their bubble is fast bursting. Dean answers on the fourth ring. "What?"

"What - what?" Sam sounds well-rested at least, if completely pissed off. "It's, like, ten AM. Since when do we get on the road after ten AM?"

"What's the rush? I slept in."

"Well, it's a little over a day to Vegas. We could be there by noon tomorrow, if we get going and really book it. Unless you've decided that you want to keep the tits after all."

"Fuck no. Let me shower; we can hit a drive-thru on the way out of the town." Dean hangs up and climbs out of bed. His thighs are sore, but otherwise he just feels lazy and sated. "So, you want to ride with us?"

Cas sits up and rubs his hands on the sheets. He's starting to close off again, though there's still affection when he meets Dean's eyes.

Now that Dean looks at him in the sunlight, everything seems off. His clothing isn't the only thing that's changed. Castiel moves slower, without the awkwardness he used to show within his vessel. The bags under his eyes and the length of his unkempt hair are all wrong.

Castiel clears his throat. "I should get back. I didn't mean to stay away for so long."

Instead of leaning in for another kiss, like his whole body is begging him to, Dean nods. "I'm going to hit the shower. Stop by more often. Whenever you want. You're always welcome, and I mean that." He grins, stumbles into the bathroom, and closes the door behind him.

Alone, he lets the panic creep in.

Because having sex with Castiel was just like scratching an itch. It's never so easy as scratching once to make the craving stop.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

The thread tied around his wrist heats when they hit the Strip. Dean recognizes the hotel the second he sees it. "There, she works there!"

As far as Sam is considered, Dean did some hard meditating and finally remembered seeing the witch's name tag. It neatly explained the sudden memory, without having to explain that Castiel stopped by. Sam is too smart for his own good, and Dean doesn't want to risk him putting two and two together.

The hotel isn't the ritziest joint, but nice enough that Dean feels out of place in the tattered Metallica shirt that had been old when he was sixteen. He looks down at the cord, now steadily hot against his skin, before he leans against the front desk.

The attendant fixes him with a bright smile, acting appropriately oblivious to how out of place they are. "How can I help you?"

"I'm looking for Gemma," Dean says. He leans forward on the counter; the angle of it pushes his breasts up. "She's an old friend. I was hoping to catch her on her lunch break. Is she around..." Dean glances at the guy's name tag and hates himself a little bit as he lowers his voice. "Brad?"

Brad nods, his return smile bold. Even Dean finds that he swoons just a little. Brad has some swagger. "Yeah, she ought to be running the bar. You sticking around?"

"Maybe. Thanks." Sam heads toward the bar as Dean rights himself, already halfway across the lobby.

Apparently Sam is as eager to get this thing over with Dean; by the time Dean arrives he's chatting up the bartender - and score! They've got the right woman. Dean stares down at his breasts one more time with a little mental _Adios!_

When Dean catches up, Sam is saying, "...and I don't know exactly what he did to piss you off so much, but we need you to fix it."

She scowls at him. She's wearing the same uniform shirt. Dean giggles just a little bit at the memory of snapping off those buttons, now that Castiel coaxed it out of hiding.

With a bland look in his direction, she says, "I'm sorry, but I have no idea what you're talking about."

Dean points on thumb at his chest. "He means these, you crazy bitch."

She squints at his face, then recoils. The initial horror then turns to something much worse: laughter. She laughs with one hand over her mouth, and inhales hard in an attempt to stop it. "Oh, you motherfucker, I can't believe - I didn't - " She waves a hand at the guy at the end of the bar trying to get her attention. "Look guys, my day bartender just called in and I've got to cover this until her replacement can make it. Get a room, alright, and I'll find you? I believe you like to check in under _Morrison_?"

Dean flushes. He hasn't expected her open vitriol – or really, anything. He's so used to overpowering the creatures they face, that meeting a pissed of chick throws him off balance. "Yeah, fine. But when we - "

"I hardly think you're in the position to make ultimatums." She snorts with laughter as she saunters down the bar.

Sam leads Dean out of the bar with one hand on his shoulder, and doesn't stop until they've settled into a corner of the lobby, a couple armchairs marking it as a quiet corner. "I don't think we should run with guns blazing," Sam says. "Let's just live and let live this time, okay?"

"Live and let - Sam, she stole my dick!" A guy leaving the bar turns to stare at them, and Dean lowers his voice. "She stole my dick, and you want to let her do it to another guy?"

Sam heaves a sigh. "Do you think she has some evil dick collection? I'm going to go out on a limb and guess this is a one-time thing. Maybe we ought to try to finish a case without a corpse, just this once." He walks away toward the front desk and turns his attention to the front desk attendant. "Hi, Brad. Looks like we'll be needing two singles."

"Seriously, still? Look, I promise I've got it all out of my system."

"Nope. Still weird." Sam handles the whole transaction in cash, and signs Dean in as Morrison.

Dean cracks his knuckles as they ride the elevator up to their floor. "So, what's the game plan? We just going to hang out and wait for her to hex us to death? She's got home field advantage, Sam."

"I don't think we're really dealing with a hardcore witch here." Sam stretches, his knuckles brushing the elevator ceiling, and yawns. "The plan now is to take a nap. I'm looking forward to sleeping in a bed that's seen clean sheets this month."

These hotels always give him the creeps. Everything is so clean and manicured and perfectly in place. "Right, sure. I'll let you know when I hear from her." He slides the stupid plastic keycard into his door four times before it lets him in. Once inside, he does what he always does - tests the bed.

It is a lot nicer than the last few beds he's slept in, and a hell of a lot better than trying to sleep in the backseat of the car. He touches that twine on his wrist; he supposes he can take it off now that they've found their witch - they didn't even really need it. But when he goes to yank the knot loose, he hesitates.

It might save his life if she tries to sneak up on him.

He's too keyed up to sleep, too psyched by the idea of getting out of his totally wrong body. He pulls out his phone and sends a text message. _How's Heaven?_

"I don't know."

Dean jolts and twists on the bed. Castiel is sitting behind him like he'd been there the whole time. It's weird enough to sit together on the bed – he hates that it's the distance that feels wrong.

"Can't you warn a guy before just showing up?" But he's not mad, and Castiel offers one of those wan almost-smiles in response. It feels like old days, except that Castiel is wearing jeans and a dark jacket that looks like something out of a military surplus store; it's just a little too big. Maybe Castiel is allergic to well-fitted coats.

_Wait a second._

Dean sits up and turns toward Castiel, but keeps his distance. "You don't know? I thought you were doing the good work after that whole... You know."

Castiel looks down at his hands. "As it turns out, the systematic murder of my family was all it took to get my Father's attention. I am no longer welcome."

"Oh. Cas, did you - "

"I'm to serve a life sentence as a human. My Father has promised that when this body fails he will welcome me not as an angel, but not as a man." Castiel's face twists momentarily, the single hint at some underlying rage. Then he exhales, flitting one hand as though to indicate smoke disappearing in the air. "I am, as always, an anomaly."

Dean can't bring himself to speak. During those last days of the Apocalypse, Castiel had looked like someone hollowed him out – he should have recognized the symptoms. "Where have you been?"

"Everywhere. I spent time in a monastery in Brazil, hoping my Father would forgive me if I regained my faith. I helped the needy. I hid. I checked on you and Sam, when I could find the courage. Eventually I realized I would need work if I intended to survive."

"You should have said something."

"What would I have said?"

Dean doesn't know.

* * *

When the phone rings it's dark in the room. Dean reaches out to see feel the rhythmic rise and fall of Castiel's chest. He doesn't actually recall falling asleep - in fact, he had emphatically sworn he wouldn't fall asleep.

An anomaly. Weren't they all?

The phone stops ringing, just to start again a second later. Dean answers with a snapped, "What?"

"I'm sorry, I was under the impression that you need my help."

"You're so not attractive when you're pissed."

"Yeah, well, you're not a particularly attractive woman, so we'll call it even. I'm going to be up there in ten minutes. Get your brother."

Castiel is awake when Dean hangs up the phone. "I should go."

"No, it's fine," Dean says, mostly because he doesn't want Castiel to go. By the end of the night this whole thing will be over, and he still doesn't know how he's going to address them. If he should pretend this never happened (he has every intention of forgetting that he was briefly a woman) or carry on like it's not contrary to everything he believes about himself.

Both options make him uneasy.

Dean reaches for his jeans. "Can you get Sam while I get dressed?"

Castiel nods and dresses quickly before letting himself out.

There's enough time to pee and get dressed before someone knocks on the door. Dean lets everyone in with a quick nod. Gemma crosses the room to the window. The twine burns when she crosses the room.

At first no one says anything. Dean wishes he had a gun, or a knife, or a length of rope - anything to express his frustration. "So, you're going to give me my dick back now?"

She snorts. "It's not that simple."

"What do you mean, 'not that simple'? It was simple enough for you to take it!"

"No, actually, it wasn't." She sighs and drops into the chair and stares out at the city while she speaks. "Look, I don't do this, right? I don't do one night stands, and I don't actually do magic. It just sort of happens sometimes. There's a coven that I meet with every other month, but we're strictly dedicated to _not_ using magic, you understand? Because I know about hunters - I know what people like do you."

Sam leans against a wall. "What makes you think we're hunters?"

Gemma flashes him a tight smile, before letting her gaze fall to Dean. "Whenever someone knows about your magic, you assume they are."

"And for someone who doesn't do magic, you sure did a number on me," Dean says, wishing everyone would stop lounging around looking so cavalier while they talk about his body. "Just unmojo it, right?"

"I didn't do it purpose. I stupidly believed that whole _I've got a job but I'll be back, this is something special, baby_ bit - which, I'm usually too smart for, I'll have you know." She waves a hand in vague disgust, and swallows some invisible bitter pill. "So, a couple weeks passed. I went on my usual coven visit. There were pints of Ben & Jerry and shitty romantic comedies and some gnashing of teeth. If men could really understand what it was like to be a woman, they'd quit lying for a chance to stick it in.

"I sort of fixated for a couple days. He'd be a terrible woman. I bet he'd understand, if he just had to go a couple days like a woman. And, well - whoops."

"Whoops? _Whoops?_" Dean is going to kill her, and they'll never find the body. There will be nothing left of the body. This is worse. If she did it on purpose, he could blame anyone but his own stupid sexual impulses. He'd have something to get mad at. This - this is _bullshit_.

"Look, whatever, you can be as pissed as you want, but it's not like you were so good to me either. And I'll fix it, if you promise to forget we ever met. Shouldn't be too hard, right?"

"That's not fair."

"It never is." She stands and adjusts the lapels of her jacket. "I'll make some calls, ask some of the more experienced women for remedies, but it's not easy to get us together. There's a reason we only meet every eight weeks. How should I get it contact with you?"

"Here, I'll give you my cell," Sam says. He exchanges cards with Gemma - well, her card and his number scrawled on hotel stationary - while Dean is still processing that he's going to have to stay like this for the indeterminate future. Castiel watches Gemma intently, as still and cold as when he was an angel. She at least has the good sense to look unnerved when she walks past him.

Dean takes her seat by the window, numb to anything but the weird casing that is his body.

Sam asks Castiel, "Does she seem legit?"

" did not sense any deceit."

"Good."

Dean shudders, either with unease or rage, but he can't tell which. "Good? This isn't _good!_ This is about as far from good as it gets." He shakes his head. "We have to find another way. I can't just sit here and wait for her to get around to finding me a way back to normal."

"We won't," Sam says. A good hard sleep must have done him some good, because he's back to patient and agreeable. "We'll go home and pour over Bobby's books. I'll do some research tonight, but let's just stay calm, okay? At least we have a plan, right?"

Dean nods. Part of him wants to fight; he wants to go back to killing monsters and saving people, but the incident with the ghoul rings in his memory. All his training is for the wrong body; he's a liability. He may as well be dead. "Just - I need some time here, okay?"

"Yeah."

Sam pats his shoulder before he leaves. Castiel makes some motion to leave, but Dean stops him with a word. He's going to have to teach Castiel when _alone_ is actually a euphemism for _I don't want Sam to see me freaking out._

They don't have sex. Castiel stays all the same.

* * *

Once they return home, Dean throws himself into work at the salvage yard while Sam pours over books and the Internet.

Taking over Bobby's side business has been interesting; Dean still decipher Bobby's address book. It seems to be about two-third hunters and one-third neglected customers. Still, they have a few regulars, and word of mouth spreads. If any of the regulars ask, he tells them he's a cousin visiting for a few weeks.

Castiel comes to visit over the first weekend. Dean tries to teach him how to fix an engine, but Castiel doesn't grasp it. His hands shake as he works, tiny tremors that Dean catches out of the corner of his eye. The dark smudges under his eyes are heavier, and he's stopped wearing the overcoat. In his civvies, he looks like a school teacher or an ad salesman on a day off.

"I've never had need for mechanics." Castiel holds his dirty hands out and looks around with a scowl on his face. "If I ever needed to fix something, it was only a matter of willing it so. Dean, my hands are filthy."

"You're dirty, not dying." Dean laughs as he tosses a rag to Castiel. "What is it you do anyway? Obviously nothing with your hands."

"I work in a library."

Dean stretches to work the stiffness out of his lower back. "Yeah? How'd that happen?"

Castiel shrugs. "There was an opening, and I have a great capacity for organization. An encyclopedic knowledge of the world has helped."

They laugh and Dean thinks he can get used to this. After everything is back to normal, he thinks he can sustain this level of intimacy, alone in the yard and laughing over the things that should hurt more. Castiel shouldn't have to work in a library. Dean shouldn't have to pee sitting down every single time.

If Sam notices that Castiel sleeps in Dean's room, he doesn't say anything.

* * *

Gemma calls halfway through the second week; her witch friends have some potential leads. A few days after that, Sam finds something in one of Bobby's old books and passes it on.

For a couple days Dean wakes up like a kid on Christmas morning, certain that this will be the morning he wakes up to find everything in the right order.

When it becomes clear that this isn't going to happen, Dean focuses entirely on work and wishes that a hunt would show up. Supernatural attacks are getting further and further apart - either the monsters are getting smarter, or things really are cooling off after the apocalypse. On top of that, hunters still call Bobby's line for leads, and expect them to know what's going down all over the country. Dean doesn't have the stomach for it, but Sam seems to enjoy gathering information and pretending to be the FBI. Perhaps it's not the worst lot in life for a hunter.

Castiel comes back on Friday. "Must be nice, standard hours," Dean jokes while he watches the same rerun of _Law & Order_ for a third time. He has no idea how they even have _Law & Order_; Bobby somehow hooked his ancient television up to four channels, and two of them are always _Law & Order_.

"I'm given to understand I have a good job," Castiel says as he sits beside Dean. "The hours are very predictable, and the benefits are good."

"'The benefits are good'? You don't even know what the means, do you?"

Castiel smiles and shrugs. "I gather I'll be glad for them when I need them."

Without thinking, Dean grabs Castiel's hand and squeezes. Castiel leans closer.

They're still holding hands when Sam finally walks in the room; he's chewing on the end of a pencil and flipping through a book. He glances over them for a second, then turns back to his book. "No one warned me that this 'raised you from perdition' gig required hand-holding. What's going on? Because Cas, all this eating and sleeping you're doing has me worried."

Castiel looks guiltily to Sam, and Dean extracts his hand from Castiel's grip.

The phone rings. Dean answers so he doesn't have to hear the story of how Castiel got kicked out of Heaven again. Because Dean can't shake the feeling that Castiel ought to hate him, that Castiel ought to blame him for everything. If only Dean had been an obedient Righteous Man, Castiel never would have rebelled.

It's several hours later, while Castiel is out picking up burgers, when Sam says, "It's cool, you know, if you guys have a thing. It makes sense. No judgment."

Dean glares at his brother, and it's clear Sam is trying his very best to keep a serious expression. "I may be a chick, but we are still closed to chick flick moments, got it?"

Sam fails to keep a straight face after all.

* * *

During the third week Dean goes through three days without even thinking about his body. He doesn't squeeze his boobs once, even just to make Sam uncomfortable.

When that sinks in, when he thinks that he's starting to get comfortable in his temporary body, Dean hides in his bedroom and drinks heavily. He only sneaks out to eat and shower when Sam is asleep or gone.

Sam deals with the customers on Thursday, and he sends Castiel up as reinforcement on Friday.

"It's not forever," Castiel says from the other side of the door when Dean refuses to let him in. It's all gotten so fucking domestic. Dean takes another swig from the bottle of scotch he'd fished from Bobby's old closet and wonders what his dad would think.

Dean laughs until his sides hurt when he tries to decide if his dad would find the vagina or the fucking-a-dude more wrong. Then again, maybe he would just be appalled that Dean is swigging good scotch from the bottle like it's cheap McCormick's rum.

Castiel's voice takes on a more concerned lilt. "Dean?"

"How do you know?" Dean shouts. The wood floor is hard under his ass, his foot has fallen asleep, and he wants to hate Castiel. He's got these two default modes of handling how he feels about Castiel: he goes numb, or he gets mad. Because Castiel is this huge _thing_ in his life, and having sex with him hasn't helped at all. It's made him larger and more prominent in Dean's thoughts. "And so what if it is forever? Maybe it'll be for the best, and we can go on like this forever. I can bake apple pies and - " Dean hiccups, then laughs, then slumps against the door. "I'm going to die a woman."

Castiel tries the doorknob again. "You're not going to die a woman."

"Maybe I'm about to die of alcohol poisoning. You don't know. Don't bury me in a dress!"

First Castiel grumbles something that Dean can't quite make out, and then, louder: "I'm getting your brother."

"You're not my real mom!"

Dean doesn't see Castiel at all that weekend. He's not sure if that hurts or helps.

* * *

One day Dean wakes up and realizes that he's been a woman for more than a month. He hasn't seen Castiel for the second weekend in a row. Instead of getting angry or - God help him - getting drunk, Dean just stamps the feelings down and gets back to work. Business is picking up, a lot more business than Dean had expected. People just assume that they're related to Bobby.

Sam finishes organizing the library and takes over the desk. Piled in one corner are seven books about witchcraft that reference body control. One evening Sam tries to explain Skype while he talks to Gemma about a passage in this particular esoteric text, and Dean gives up. He resigns himself to a life of Cosmopolitan and tampons and whatever the shit else it was he's supposed to like now that he's got lady parts.

That evening, sitting on the front porch steps with a beer in hand, he calls Castiel. He's surprised when Castiel actually answers. "Um. Hi." In the background someone yells something about a bong. "What's going on?"

"My housemate has friends over."

Dean laughs despite himself. "You have a roommate?"

"Yes. It seems to be the pragmatic thing one does when finding a place to live. Luke is student. He works at the library as well."

"Ah." Dean pauses and blows out a breath, staring off into the sky. It's one of those great transitory nights, still a bit chilly but comfortable. "Sorry. I wanted to say that. Because I was being ridiculous, hiding my room like a child. Sorry."

Castiel sounds fond. "You said that already."

"I'm just really tired of this, and it's worse when it just becomes a reality instead of a nightmare. I freaked." Dean takes another sip of his beer and relishes the flavor. "But you know. Nothing I can do about it now except never have sex with an inexperienced witch again, right?"

"Dean, this isn't forever. I look forward to the day that Sam and Gemma negate the spell and restore your body."

"Sure. Me too. In the mean time, are you busy?" The silence hangs, and Dean can hear Castiel's roommate laughing in the background. Some bass-heavy beat thumps slowly, but the noise is muted by the phone. "I mean, if you can come over. I don't know if you can - "

"I can."

Dean rolls his eyes and hangs up his phone. "Careful, your bad sense of humor is showing."

"It takes some effort." Castiel settles down on the step beside Dean. He takes Dean's offered beer with a nod of thanks and rubs his free hand in slow circles between Dean's shoulders.

"So," Dean asks as he plucks his beer back and leans against Castiel, "I've been meaning to ask: the boobs. You don't seem overly interested."

"They're just breasts." Dean motions for him to continue. Castiel frowns. "I have no context for what you want to know. We've discussed how I feel about this body - it is a good, healthy body but it is not yours. The breasts have no meaning to me, other than knowing that to you, they are a marker of femininity."

"Yeah, but when I have sex with a chick, the boobs are at least a third of what makes the experience awesome. Sometimes when I get sad, I look at them in the mirror and pretend they're not mine."

"Perhaps, if that's what you enjoy about having sex with a woman. But I'm not having sex with a woman. I'm having sex with you, just as you are."

Dean nuzzles his face into the curve of Castiel's neck and inhales the scent of smoke and soap. "Don't make it weird."

Castiel turns his head to kiss Dean. "I don't think it is."

* * *

Dean has morning wood.

He half reflexively stretches and rubs against the sheets before something fires in his brain and he realizes _he has morning wood_. He jumps out of bed and strips naked, staring down past his flat, muscled chest down to the majesty that is his cock.

Oh God, he could weep. He instead runs down the hall to where he can hear the shower running and barrels right in. "Sam! Sam! I'm me again!"

"Huh?"

Dean flings the shower curtain back. "Check it! I haven't seen this thing in 42 days. I'm so happy I could fucking kiss it."

"Dean, I haven't even had coffee yet." Sam pulls the shower curtain closed. "Go put some pants on. We'll have a celebratory high five in half an hour."

It's impossible to get mad with an erection so glorious. Dean goes back to his bedroom. It's one of those overly cheerful sunny mornings, where the sun streams perfectly through the windows like God wants to shine the brightest spotlight right on his dick.

He pulls on his clothes that finally fit exactly like they're supposed to, and makes the trek down to the gates to open up the yard for business. They won't see their first customers for a couple hours yet, and Dean considers beating off just because he can. Instead, he snags a cup of coffee and sits at the kitchen table with Sam. "Did you guys figure it out?"

"She didn't send any messages, but clearly." Sam sips his coffee and yawns. When Dean holds out his hand for that celebratory high five, he complies half-heartedly. "Everything feel normal?"

Dean stretches and nods. "It's like pulling on a pair of jeans out of the dryer. It's perfect."

"Good." Sam closes his laptop and leans back in his chair. "So, are you going to miss it?"

"No," Dean says firmly. He taps the front of his pants, just to make sure it's still there. This is amazing. It's like existing again, after weeks of feeling like he was disappearing and some girl was taking his place. "I am going to celebrate."

"Definitely." Sam gives him one of those long, imploring looks before he asks, "Are you going to wait to tell Cas when he visits tomorrow?"

Dean freezes, and his good mood? Gone. The elephant in the room just let out a great big honk and he has to look at it dead on. He clears his throat. "No reason not to tell him now. Did he ever tell you about how he feels about my body?" Dean tries for lecherous, but it comes out sort of wistful.

Sam makes a noise of disgusted protest to humor him.

Dean sends a text message, even though he knows Castiel has already left for work: _I'm me again._

It doesn't take long for Castiel to reply. _You always were. I told you it wouldn't last forever._

Dean closes his phone. "Hey, I need a shower," he says, his voice just a little weak. "Cover the yard?"

"Of course," Sam says without looking up from his laptop. Dean heads upstairs, leaving his phone on the table; he strips and climbs into the shower and tries not to panic.

He was no different yesterday from today, except for the shape of his junk. He washes his hair and tries not to panic. Castiel just - he just doesn't get it. They hadn't actually been -

Dean can't quite bring himself to put a word to it. There's not a word to define what they were, and he doesn't want to touch the one that would describe what they could become.

pcenter⊱⊰/center/p


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four**

Everything changes, but no one mentions it. Dean can't resume any of the open closeness they had when he was playing girl.

And now Dean sees it plainly: he had been pretending without acknowledging that it wasn't a fucking game. There were feelings and implications and he shouldn't have given in. Not when he knew he couldn't hack it in the long haul.

Because he can't. He tries to bring himself to embrace all those feelings - still there, never gone - but an extra dick to the mix changes everything.

Even knowing that the problem is entirely in him, Dean doesn't know how to want this. He can't reach out to Castiel. He can't possibly ask Castiel to make that first move. So he falls back on the standby: he shoves it down and pretends it doesn't exist.

Castiel crashes on a fold-out couch and doesn't press the issue.

* * *

Three glorious weeks pass without a care in the world. Sort of.

On one hand, Castiel's visits go from entire weekends to Saturdays to every other Sunday for lunch. Sam, either in self-preservation or because he recognizes that something is amiss, doesn't act like this is unusual.

On the other hand, Dean really enjoys his life. The occasional pang of loss sucks, but not so hard that it can't be hidden under moderate drinking. And he's working on cars every day. They're making a steady enough income that they can call it _income_ instead of _hustling_. They pay bills. And taxes.

They're practically civilians.

But then he starts to ache, low on the left side of his body. After ignoring it for awhile, he finally finds himself with an ache deep enough that he sits inside, nursing a handful of pain killers and a shot glass of vodka.

"That's really not how you're supposed to handle pain," Sam says, looking up from a book he's reading for some case Garth is running. "I'm pretty sure you're actually making your liver worse."

"I'll worry about that when my liver hurts," Dean snaps, throwing back the pills and the shot in one go before reclining back on the couch. It's a weird intermittent throb that feels entirely too much like being stabbed.

Sam closes the book and hovers over Dean; while Sam was always a whiz with the whiskey-and-dental-floss method of medical care, this sort of shit is clearly out of his comfort zone. "Pulled a muscle?"

"Probably." Dean stretches and massages the sore point, trying to work it out, but instead ends up curled inward and swearing. He wastes the entire afternoon in dull, boring pain watching shitty daytime television.

For once, he handles the phones and Sam handles the cars.

* * *

It goes on for _weeks_, with Dean limping around the yard and wondering if the maximum milligrams per day is a suggestion or a hard rule.

"Just make a doctor's appointment," Sam says as he helps Dean haul the engine out of wrecked Chevy Nova. "This is getting ridiculous."

"I've survived worse." Fuck it - it's probably just a suggestion. As Dean dumps two more pills from the bottle, Sam shoots forward and knocks them from his hand. "What the fuck?"

"Get in the car." Sam wipes his hands on his pants and puts their tools away quickly, but with precision; Sam hates when the tools are awry. "I'm driving you to the ER, and that's all there is to it. You look like you're going to fall over any minute."

"I'm not," even though yeah, Dean sort of feels like he might just tip over. Still, he helps Sam put everything away, and makes sure that the front gate is locked and the sign turned to "Closed" before they leave.

The ER is mostly empty when they arrive. There's a small child crying on his mother's lap in one corner, and a nonchalant guy with a hand wrapped in a blood-soaked towel. The nurse behind the admissions desk chews gum in a slow circular bites.

Sam handles all the paperwork and insurance nonsense, while Dean sits in a chair with his hand over his abdomen and wonders who he pissed off this time. Maybe Castiel was trying to -

No. Of all the people in the world, Sam was more likely to kill him slowly than Castiel. Dean recognizes the idea for what it is; a way to force an artificial schism between them. He refuses to do that, not again.

When the doctor calls Dean back, he's smiling. He looks like the colonel from KFC, but Dean keeps that to himself. "It sounds like a case of appendicitis," the Doctor says as he closes the exam room door. "If it is, we'll probably have you into surgery post-haste, just to get that sucker out. Lay back on the table."

"That sucks." Dean hisses when the doctor palpates the region that hurts the most. Despite this, the doctor seems calm and even a bit pleased. "So, appendicitis?"

"Looks like. I want to get a look, really quick, before we admit you..." The doctor leaves, and comes back wheeling in a small ultrasound machine. Dean closes his eyes.

Last time he was in the hospital was when Alistair had nearly killed him. Dean still remembers Castiel, sitting there and quietly explaining that Dean was the only person who could end the Apocalypse that he had single-handedly started. He'd been so fucking terrified, so done with the world right then.

And here he is, getting his appendix looked at by a fast food mascot. Go figure.

"Huh."

Dean opens his eyes. "Huh?"

"That's - " The doctor's laugh is thin; he rubs his beard and leans closer to the screen. "That seems quite unlikely. Maybe there's a disc in here..." While the doctor checks the machine, Dean peers at it. It just looks like a bunch of static to him. The doctor stares at the screen again. "Well, it's not appendicitis."

"But?"

The doctor moves the slick wand over the part that hurts the most, _why the fuck_, and makes another noise of surprise. "Some sort of growth. It just looks peculiar."

Dean's blood runs cold, and he peers at the growth. Something flutters in the middle of the screen in grainy black and white. "Peculiar how? Cancer peculiar?" He almost says _I had stomach cancer for four minutes once_, but then remembers that it would make no sense to Colonel Doctor.

When the doctor speaks, he does so with a forced sense of cheer. "I'm going to schedule a biopsy and an OR. Whatever it is, it's not supposed to be growing there. Excuse me for a few minutes."

Dean has his phone out the second the doctor leaves. _There's something growing on my organs._

Castiel replies after a few excruciating long minutes. _What is it?_

_Fuck if I know. The doctor didn't say._

That's enough to bring Castiel; he walks in as though he had been waiting outside.

"Hey, can you come give this a look?" Dean holds out the discarded wand, still covered in gel.

"I don't need it." Castiel touches Dean's forehead with two fingers and yanks them away as though burned. He's staring at Dean as though there's something horrible under his skin.

"What?" Castiel doesn't move or speak, which only worries Dean more. "What is it?"

Moving slowly, Castiel touches his forehead again, eyes closed and head tilted as though he's listening very carefully.

"I'm not dying of cancer, man," Dean says, because Castiel is being too quiet for his comfort. "I've been killed plenty of times, but cancer? No. I will take a long drive off a short cliff before I die slowly in a hospital."

"You're not dying." Castiel frowns, pinches the bridge of his nose, and squeezes his eyes shut, looking more exhausted and bedraggled than when Dean was a chick. He picks up the wand and stares at it intently. It doesn't take him more than a minute to absorb how to work the machine, and he's got the wand pressed too hard on Dean's sore spot.

"That," Castiel says, jabbing his finger at the screen, "is a human life."

The world stops.

Literally. The doctor opens the door; Castiel flings an arm out and the doctor freezes in place, one foot in the air and a hand on the doorknob. Castiel replaces the wand on the machine. He takes a deep breath, and stares at Dean as though he's going to find some answer there.

"No fucking way." Dean stares at the screen, then down at his slick and throbbing abdomen. Nope. Impossible.

"We're talking about a dying human - I am incredibly serious," Castiel says. He sits on the rolling stool in the room, elbows on his knees and his face in his hands. "I was quite unaware this sort of thing happened to males. I thought I knew how humans worked in their entirety."

"This thing doesn't happen to - did she fucking put a - " Dean almost wishes he has the boobs back. The boobs were fine, the boobs were a fucking cake walk compared to - to - "Dying?"

Castiel nods, peering at the image frozen on the screen. "There's no residual magic," he says. "It seems more likely that this was something left behind. It did not exist when your body was changed; it remained when the witch took back her curse."

"Let's go back to dying," Dean says. "So, this is going to fix itself. Just - problem solved?"

"It risks your health; it would be far wiser to let me handle it now."

_Handle it_ makes Dean raise an eyebrow. How exactly does an angel go about erasing a fetus from a dude's organs? He can't imagine it comes up very often.

Dean relaxes. He's had his fill of impossible for the last couple months, and isn't looking to add to the list. He opens his mouth to say yes, and then it hits him

It was something that did not exist.

Now it does.

"You knocked me up!" Dean sits upright and stares down at Castiel, still sitting on the stool and staring at the monitor. It's nothing. It's a little parasitic blob leeching off one of his organs and quietly ruining his life by _existing._

"It would look that way. I had no way of knowing you would be fertile."

"Why are you so fucking calm about this?"

"The poor creature doesn't have much time left. This is the best mercy I can do it."

"It's - " Oh fuck him, he's not going to say it. He's got all these nostalgic images of Ben, baby pictures and his tenth birthday and listening to Led Zeppelin in the truck on a hot summer afternoon. This isn't the same thing. "Aren't there other options?"

Castiel frowns. "No."

"Come on, you can't tell me there's nothing better than a mercy killing in my gut, because that's pretty much the most depressing end of the day I can imagine." Dean looks at the doctor frozen in time, and wonders if Sam is suffering the same fate in the waiting room. "I could do the girl thing a bit longer, if I have to," he says, and hates it. It's the very last thing in the world he wants. He's already mourning his penis.

It's almost a relief when Castiel says, "No. The witch can't control her powers that well, and I don't have that kind of power over you. I wouldn't, even if I did."

"A middle ground, then," Dean snaps. "Throw a - throw a fucking uterus in there, since I apparently had one for a while."

Castiel stands to pace; he runs his hands through his hair and shoves them in his pockets. He scowls over his shoulder at each rotation. "Why?"

"Because," Dean says as though that's an argument at all. Because he remembers trying to talk his mother out of having him once, and he remembers the look in her eyes. Because something stupid is happening to him, and he's trying to find a silver lining in life.

Because it's something that belongs to Castiel, and Dean feels like that should count for something.

"It probably won't work," Castiel mutters as he approaches Dean, his expression dark. "It may not even survive." He leans in close and presses both hands hard against Dean's pelvis. "And it will hurt."

That's not a lie. The throb and ache that's dominated Dean's life the past few weeks grows into something more, something searing and wrenching. His insides are ripping apart. He screams; throws his head back and outright roars as his insides are moved and recreated under his skin. He's going to die. Covered in sweat, Dean wonders if Castiel decided to kill him after all. At least it isn't cancer.

Then it's over.

Castiel looks just as exhausted as Dean feels, but more serene. He stares at his hands where they're pressed fast to Dean's abdomen. He inhales deep, and holds for a moment before he exhales. "Consider this a miracle."

"It worked?"

"For now. I can't tell how long it will hold. I am not as strong as I was; perhaps I can't bind a body properly anymore." Castiel leans away from him.

Dean sits up, stretching experimentally. He doesn't hurt. The ache is gone, and it doesn't feel like his organs are about to come spilling out his stomach. He feels... normal. Just completely normal.

Castiel crosses to the doctor and pats his shoulder.

The world begins to move again, the transition non-existent; it makes Dean queasy.

The doctor smiles again. "Nothing to worry about, Mr. Winchester; just a pulled muscle."

Dean nods. "Of course. Thanks, Doc."

Castiel is gone before Dean hits the lobby, and he realizes - he's going to have to tell Sam.

* * *

Dean lets Sam drive home, mostly because he's starting to get shaky as the reality of his situation sinks in. It seemed so noble at the time. Saving lives is exactly what their dad raised them to do.

Oh shit, a _life_? This was going to end in a baby.

"Cas knocked me up," he says in one rushed breath. That's the way to do it. Like pulling duct tape off a hostage's mouth - better to do it quickly.

It's several minutes before Sam says, "So I wasn't imagining the loud sex, then." He shakes his head. "Man, didn't Dad give _you_ the uncomfortable talk about condoms? Because I was 15 and - "

"Alright, that's enough! How was I supposed to think that I was Fully Functioning Barbie?"

Sam shrugs. "So, um, did you...?" Eventually he gets there; he swerves onto the shoulder of the road and slams on the brakes. A passing SUV honks, but Sam doesn't seem to notice. He stares right at Dean like he can read the details right off of Dean's body. "You mean that's what all this was? Shouldn't you be in an operating room, with your body on its way to medical science?"

Dean looks out the window, unable to look Sam in the eye. "I sort of had Cas, um, fix it. So that it doesn't die and slowly rot attached to my - appendix, I think." He should have checked that.

Leaning back in his seat, Sam stares out the windshield at the cars rushing past. "You're not fucking with me?"

"I wish I were."

"Huh." Sam looks over his shoulder before pulling into traffic again. They cruise at the speed limit on the short drive back to the yard. "So, you're definitely doing this?"

"As long as it holds together - Cas wasn't exactly confident that it would. But, you know. Fighting chance." He's suddenly uncomfortable, and he knows what Sam is going to ask next.

"Why?"

Dean shrugs. "Why not? It was already there."

* * *

It's 2AM, and Sam's snoring could wake the dead. Downstairs on the couch, Dean couldn't sleep even if he had tried. He doesn't know if Castiel is suffering similarly, or if he somehow knew that Dean was still awake, but he's suddenly there. He sits beside Dean on the couch.

"Have you told him?"

"He's still in shock."

"He is not alone."

"Nope."

Dean focuses on the television rather than the angel sitting to his right. He wants to say everything, so instead he says nothing at all.

"This is a long shot," Castiel finally says. "Not just because it's unlikely, but because my abilities are waning with time."

"You rewired my guts just fine."

"I used you as a battery. You contain more than a little of my previous grace," Castiel says. "Six months ago I didn't need sleep or sustenance. Two months ago I couldn't feel pain. For all I know, when my grace is gone, anything created with it will fail as well."

"It's better than no shot at all, right?"

Castiel's expression is peculiar - he's puzzled and weary, yes, but also maybe a little pleased. Or maybe Dean imagines that. It's too dim to tell. "Is this something you actually want? I always assumed you left your life with Lisa because you did not enjoy it."

"I enjoyed it," Dean says, instantly defensive. "Lisa was great. I consider my time with her and Ben as one of best things I ever did. But it didn't fit. You can't force these things."

"I'm aware."

Ah. Awkward silence - Dean's least favorite thing in the world. A part of him wants to clap Castiel on the shoulder and make some lewd comment, something about drinking or whores or anything but what he actually says: "I wouldn't take it back."

Castiel stares resolutely at the television, his expression stone still and illuminated in the tinted light of the television. "Is it so different now?"

"Absolutely," but even Dean knows that's a half-truth. Castiel is so close and he smells just the same. Dean already knows him so completely, but it would be something different now. He shakes his head and forces himself to look away from Castiel. "Probably not, but yes."

Castiel reaches forward and touches his cheek, like maybe he's going to kiss Dean anyway. Instead he pulls his hand back. All too suddenly he stands. "The child is fine for now."

"Cas, wait." Dean leans forward. It should be different; there should be some difference to the way he feels when he moves, but nothing feels strange at all within him. _This is so fucked up._ "How are we..." Nope, that question is too big. Try smaller. "What should I expect?"

Castiel falls back into his seat with a huff of laughter. "You think I know?" But he seems to give it some thought, because eventually he starts speaking like a kid reciting a paper. "The child will grow and displace your organs. It will leech nutrients from your body, especially if your intake is insufficient. Your abdomen will distend, and - "

"Okay, okay, but that's - " Dean rubs his face with his hands and wonders for about the millionth time if he's made the right decision. "What if something goes wrong?" What he wants to ask is _where will you be?_

Sometimes, it seems like Castiel can read his mind. Looking off toward the door, he says, "I can be here in an instant. I will know. Above all else, I will not allow you to die."

That's enough. It's more than Dean deserves.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five**

As it turns out, pregnancy is a lot of nothing. For two weeks he doesn't even mention it. Sam doesn't say anything. Castiel doesn't show. And he doesn't feel any different.

So, Dean fixes cars and wrecks the ones that can't be saved. He keeps the stupid, faded piece of twine tied around his wrist meticulously clean. It doesn't do anything now but keep him on track when he sometimes feels like he's going to lose his mind.

"What's that about, anyway?" one of the regulars asks - Donny, this thirty-something guy who knew Bobby and has a weird taste for buying shitty cars at estate sales. "You don't look to be the bracelet type."

Dean laughs under his breath and drops the hood of the Yugo. "Sobriety token," he says. "Whenever I feel myself slipping, I like to have a reminder."

Donny nods knowingly. "What's my damage?"

"It's a _Yugo_, Donny. I don't think there's anything but damage." While Donny chuckles about it, Dean writes out an estimate. Once the haggling is done and they've agreed on the work, Dean goes in for lunch. He's starving. He keeps expecting nausea - every movie he's ever seen that featured a pregnant chick assured him he would be puking at every moment – but nothing. Instead he eats like he's twelve and heading into a growth spurt.

While his hot dogs heat up in the microwave, Sam walks in with his tablet. These days he always seems to have something in hand, some sort of research or yard work problem he's solving. "I've been thinking," he says as he sits, "that you're probably in your second trimester now."

The microwave squeals. Dean retrieves his hot dogs and takes three bites before he asks around a full mouth, "What?"

"I've been doing math."

Dean joins Sam and leans over to look at the tablet, which has some website up with a colorful picture of a baby floating in a bluish-purple sac. Dean makes a face. He nods, because he doesn't trust his voice.

"Obvious we can't know for sure, unless Cas can tell, but I'm going with 13 weeks, maybe 14 if you have the worst luck ever."

"Go for 14, then." Dean rotates the tablet so that the images are right-side up. "That's it?" He takes another bite of his hot dog and zooms in on the first photo. "Look at the head on that thing. Like it's not weird enough that I'm a dude with a uterus, it's a fucking alien."

"It's not an alien." Sam pulls the device back and holds it upright. "It'll have a normal head in no time. The whole thing is going to go really fast, Dean."

"If it lasts that long."

Sam leans back in the chair, setting the tablet face down on the table. "Is that how we're going to do this?"

"Do what?" Dean asks with his mouth full because if he doesn't keep eating, surely he's just going to keep jamming that foot right in.

"Every time we bring up the fact that you're currently pulling a _Junior_, are you going to bring up that it can go wrong at any minute?"

"What, do you want to pretend that it can't?"

Dean looks away first. He hates the way Sam does that - look at him long enough and read every feeling right off him. And Dean knows it's happened again, because Sam says, "Look, it might. Reality might remember that you being pregnant is nuts, that this kid shouldn't exist - but it exists today, alright? Right now, you're going to be a dad."

"And that doesn't strike you as totally fucked up?" Dean rubs his face. His stomach turns. "Maybe I should have asked Cas to end the thing's miserable little life instead."

"Why didn't you?"

"I already - "

"You gave me a non-committal, bullshit answer. What went through your head when you decided to keep it?"

"It was going to die." Dean picks up the tablet again; he glances over the article. Size of a lemon. Heartbeats and thumb sucking. He smiles at the image, and tries to imagine that thing, in him. He can't, but it's a nice idea. "Look, I can't - I don't want to talk about it."

"I just don't want to spend this whole time waiting for the other shoe to drop. This is happening. Let's just roll with it." Sam takes his device back. "In other domestic news, Jody recommended an accountant in town to keep the books in order. I'm meeting with her later this week."

"What? We don't - "

"Legitimate business," Sam's smile could light up a city block; who would have guessed that something as simple as a legitimate business would please him that much? "I can't manage it on my own, especially not while running the phones and doing research. We decided to do this for real, and it's gotten busy enough that we need professional help."

Dean snorts. "Fine, fine; go get legitimate. I've got a car to dismantle." He leaves Sam mumbling to himself, and instead organizes his tools. He has some time - no one is coming in for the busted up Corolla any time soon. He gives Castiel a call, turning it on speaker and setting it on his workbench.

"I'm at work, Dean."

Dean smiles. Castiel sounds all the right sorts of perturbed and business-like - not nearly as human as he had the last time they met. "I was actually wondering if you wanted to stop by, let me know if this whole uterus thing is holding. It's been a couple weeks, and I just - " _Want to see you_ is out of the question. "I'd like to know that it's alright."

"Of course. I can be there this evening. Are you feeling well?"

"Totally normal."

"Good. I'll see to you later, Dean."

"Yeah." He hangs up the phone and sets in to work on the Corolla.

* * *

_That evening_ turns out to be much later in the night than Dean expected. He had dozed off - promised Sam that he was just taking a quick cat nap before Castiel arrived. He wakes up to Castiel rubbing his back. The room is dark. "The hell? I thought you would be here earlier."

"I was distracted." Castiel smells of soap and smoke; he always smells the same now. He used to smell electric, like someone had just struck a match. Dean misses it. "Sam is asleep as well. Should I have waited?"

"It's fine." Dean rolls his shoulders and leans back into Castiel's touch. "Sam did a bunch of math. He's thinking we'll have this thing in February some time."

Castiel slides one hand around to Dean's stomach, his touch hot against Dean's skin. He's too close, but Dean doesn't want to move. It's a rare moment hidden from his real life, and he closes his eyes to relish it.

One of Castiel's knees presses into the small of Dean's back. "It's fine for now," he says. When Castiel pulls his hand away, Dean grips his wrist. "Dean."

"Everything is so fucking strange." Dean pulls, just slightly, and Castiel shifts to lay behind him. Dean focuses on inhaling, exhaling, existing. "Is it crazy that I'm excited? We're having a kid."

"For now."

"Sam doesn't want to talk like that. He wants to just drink in the moment. He probably wants this more than we do." Dean laughs, just a little bit, to diffuse his own welling feelings of panic and yearning.

"I assure you, he does not."

Dean rests his hand over Castiel's. "I have no idea what I'm going to do, but... I don't know, it's sort of nice. It's something that connects us."

"I cannot keep riding this line between intimacy and neglect." Castiel rests his forehead against the back of Dean's neck and sighs. "I wish you would look at me."

It would be so easy. Face Castiel - let him into the place where he already exists in Dean's heart. Say to hell with the things he says in his head.

Instead, he tightens his hand over Castiel's and just breathes.

* * *

Sam starts cooking breakfast regularly, which is good because Dean is starving all the time. Starving and pissed off. Nothing happens for the better part of two months, and then all of a sudden his body changes. He's sleeping like shit. His gut feels thick and bloated feeling - in his nightmares it turns into full-on Hollywood Baby Bump.

Dean has always had vivid nightmares; being a pregnant freak made it worse.

So when he comes down the stairs, still wearing his pajama pants and aching from another shitty night's sleep, the last thing he expects to hear from Sam is, "Congrats on the halfway mark!"

"What, is there a fucking prize?" Dean lowers himself into a chair and stares dejectedly down at his gut. "What's the big deal?"

Sam sets a plate of eggs and sausage in front of him and returns with a cup of coffee and a prenatal vitamin. Dean doesn't even know if his system is wired up like it would matter, but he obediently swallows it for Sam's benefit.

Sam looks downright chipper - Dean would think he was the one expecting a baby. "Well, if this were a normal pregnancy you would probably be finding out the sex. But look, you're already this far. It's all downhill. We're celebrating."

With a mouthful of sausage, Dean shakes his head. "Nope, not celebrating. There's nothing to celebrate here." It's not that he regrets the whole thing, necessarily, but he can't stop worrying.

Also, it's been weeks since he last saw Castiel. One minute they had been spooning. The next, it was morning and Dean was alone. Castiel just sends the occasional text now: _I checked in last night, but you were asleep; all is well._

"We need a nursery."

Dean startles out of his thoughts. "We really don't."

Sam grins over his own breakfast. "Too bad. I ordered a crib and it is waiting for us at the nearest store. The yard is closed today. You and I are buying baby things."

"Isn't that bad luck or something?"

"You're a pregnant dude. I'm not thinking there's a whole lot of lore here."

Dean complains while he eats, and while he gets dressed - he has to wear a bigger t-shirt and do this thing with a rubber band to close his jeans - but he gives in.

They hop in the Impala and Sam leads the way to the most garish chain store Dean has ever seen. They walk in the door and it exudes baby. It's large and has the warehouse look of a chain store; everything seems to be either white, blue, pink, or yellow.

He's surrounded by couples. Pregnant women and screeching kids and a dude wearing a kid on his chest with what looks like a big scarf. "I'd rather be hunting a ghoul," Dean says under his breath.

"Tough," Sam says as he grabs a cart. He white-knuckles it around the handle. "It's not that hard. I have a list." He pulls the folded square of paper from his back pocket.

"A list?" Dean's eyes bug out at the sheer volume of stuff. "What the fuck, Sam! This thing is a mile long - what the hell is a receiving blanket?"

Sam shrugs. "Maybe the baby is wearing it when you get it from the hospital."

"What, like a burrito at Chipotle?"

Sam gives Dean the cart and takes the lead. _Thank god._ He has no idea what half these things are supposed to be, and being here makes his anxiety worse. At least he can push a cart without fucking it up.

"We'll go simple today, but by the time the day is out, I want it to at least look like we're trying."

To anyone else Sam probably sounds determined, but Dean can make out the subtle anxiety in his voice. He tries to return a reassuring smile. "Hey, it's going to be fine. All downhill from here, right?"

Sam smiles. "Right."

They take it an aisle at a time. Sam buys bottles and a couple cans of formula. He ponders diapers like he used to read lore, and the things come in boxes nearly as big as the cart.

Dean doesn't miss that in addition to the boxes of 'newborn,' he adds a smaller bag marked 'premie.' It's not like Dean. He knows that born too early is their best case scenario.

They swing by the furniture department. Sam gets an associate to tell him where to go to find out about this crib. Dean balks when he sees the size of the box. "Can we even fit that in the back of the Impala?"

Sam shifts the box so that it's standing length-wise; he measures it against his body and nods. "Yeah, definitely. Though maybe we'll order the mattress online."

The associate laughs and helps Sam load it on the bottom of the cart. "Adopting?" she asks with a wide smile. "I love seeing expecting parents prepare."

Dean tries not to laugh.

Sam nods in earnest. "Halfway now."

"Exciting! Oh, it's goes so fast."

"Yes it does," Dean says, because its the sort of thing he's supposed to say. He'd rather say, _No, it is the most drawn out thing ever._ They part ways with happy smiles – "We're fine, we have a list - thank you very much."

With the crib box perched precariously on the bottom of the cart, Sam insists on a couple more stops. He holds up a bag of blue and pink onesies, frowning at the weight suggestions and sizes. "Do you ever wonder if you're having a boy or girl?"

Dean shrugs and reaches for some white ones. He may not have learned a lot on the road, but he knows that bleach can get nastiest stains out of white. "Nah. It doesn't change anything."

"What, not even names?" Sam replaces the pink and blue packages, but tosses a yellow one in the cart.

"Haven't even considered it." Dean stares at the smallest socks he's ever seen, and is suddenly overcome with the urge to shut the whole thing down. There's no way he can ever be responsible for anything that small. "Besides, isn't that the sort of thing the parents discuss together?" His stomach churns at the idea. Parents. As in, the two of them together, raising a child. It doesn't seem very likely. "I haven't heard from Cas in weeks."

"Right." Sam looks equally spooked by the socks, but he puts them in the cart anyway. Staring over their haul, he clears his throat. "Let's do this."

When Sam checks out, he uses a bank card that has his real name on it: Samuel Winchester. Over a picture of trees and shit. The cashier waves cheerily at them as they head out to the parking lot. It's like everyone who works in a baby store has to be really happy about it all the time.

Dean doesn't say anything until they've reached the car and begun packing up their supplies. "When did that happen?" Dean asks as he watches Sam load the crib box into car. "And I can help."

"Nope," Sam grunts. "I've got it." With the crib (barely) in the backseat of the Impala, they load the rest of the bags and diaper boxes into the trunk. Dean misses his guns, and his haphazard assortment of knives. Knives and ammunition make sense. Premie diapers do not. "When did what happen?"

"Banks. We use a bank?" Dean inhales in the scent of leather when they climb in the car. Everything else is weird and impossible, but the Impala continues to smell like home.

Sam sighs, one of those long suffering, _I cannot believe we're having this conversation_ noises. "I told you, like, three months ago. Your name is on it too."

Dean starts the car. "We have a joint bank account?"

"Yeah."

Chuckling, Dean pulls out of the parking lot. He can't wait until this stupid store full of stepford employees is a dot in the rear view mirror. "It's a little gay, Sam."

"Said the only guy in the car who has had sex with a man."

Dean tries to laugh - he really does. Just like every day he tells himself that he should just get over it and call Castiel. He stumbles over a half-hearted snicker.

"What?" Sam asks.

Dean pulls onto the highway.

"Are you seriously going to sit there, _pregnant_, and get uptight about sex?"

Dean clears his throat. "I was a girl."

"No, you were renting out a girl-shaped body. Are you freaking out?"

"No, Sam, I am a beach of serenity in a sea of crazy - of course I'm freaking out! I'm not..." Dean keeps his focus on the road, but it's hard. "Look, I'm not gay, okay? I was a girl, he was a guy, and we tried it out. And it was great. But now I can't."

"Won't."

"Don't tell me how I feel." The yard is fast approaching; Dean presses just a little harder on the gas. He's been trapped in the car with Sam for decades - Sam is the best at forcing awkward emotional talks when there's no escape.

"Dean, I'm not saying that it's not a little unexpected. But being with Cas and being gay don't have to be the same thing. You don't have to run around declaring your pride."

The fence is visible on the horizon. If he can stave off the conversation for just a little bit longer, he can make it to sweet freedom. "Sounds like some new-age bullshit to me."

Sam smacks his arm and Dean just knows that he's rolling his eyes. "You're pregnant and trying to cling to a raft of normalcy. Let it go. Our life is different, but that doesn't make it normal."

* * *

One of the unused rooms in Bobby's house has been a bright sort of beige for as long as Dean can remember, a weird contrast to the overbearing grey in the rest of the house. It's small, barely large enough for the double bed that Sam and Dean shared as kids. The color has faded with time.

They squish side-by-side on the bed, surveying the minute cracks in the ceiling and the scuffed floorboards. Sam has his hands folded behind his head, his feet up on the foot board. "Well?"

"You're right. It's perfect for a nursery."

With that, they get to work. First they dismantle the bed and slide the pieces down the hall, but Sam only lets Dean carry the small pieces. Dean finds himself wondering if the metal of the bed frame is pure enough to protect against ghosts.

"Go fold those clothes," Sam says from the other end of the hallway, grunting as he pushes another smaller dresser from Dean's room toward the nursery.

Dean settles into taking apart all the blankets and the sheets and the tiny clothes marked with a "P" under size. Why the hell did all this shit require so much packaging?

As it turns out, a receiving blanket is just a square of cotton. It would make a good make-shift bandage, if he was still on the road.

As Sam slides the dresser against one wall, he asks. "How do you think Bobby would react?"

"He'd lose it, probably." Dean moves the clothes and blankets, unfolded, in the dusty drawers. "He would call me every name in the book for not thinking - well, you know." Fuck it - they can wash it all later. "But, he would've dealt with it. Bobby dealt with everything."

"Yeah."

They tackle the crib together. The directions don't make sense, but thankfully the pieces are all clearly labeled. They've got three sides assembled when Dean finally asks, "What's with all the premature baby stuff you're trying to pretend you didn't buy?"

Sam looks up through the slats from the other side of the crib. For a second the emotions on his face shift like he's about to lie. But whatever the impulse is, it segues into resignation. He hasn't looked so tired since the last time they were on a hunt. "I've been talking to Cas."

"Really?" Dean tries not to be jealous. He's usually not a jealous guy, but lately he seems to lose track of his feelings. It's not that Sam and Castiel aren't friends, it's just that Dean always figured he had something special.

"Yeah. We've - um, we think that you should probably stay with him for a while."

"Wait, you've been trying to move me out without even telling me?"

"Not like that." Sam looks away, which may as well yell guilty. "We were talking, at first, whether it would be better for him to come here. But he's in an urban area, so if anything goes wrong - "

"For those of us not in the loop? Why the hell are we talking cohabitation?"

Sam finishes screwing in the piece of wood in hand. "Cas can't fly anymore. If something goes wrong, he can't get here."

"What the fuck are we doing all this for, if - look, I told you. He told me. It probably won't last."

"But maybe it will. If you make it another month, the baby has a chance - _even_ just a small one. I just wanted to buy into hope for a day. So, you know, let's finish the crib. You'll have something to look forward to."

Sam smiles, but he's clearly bothered. Dean knew that Sam was keeping on top of this baby stuff, the same he always kept on the research and still keeps up with the other hunters, but for the first time he wonders how much of the worry he's been hiding.

Dean isn't sure if he wants to hit Sam, or maybe hug him. This whole thing is ridiculous, and the idea that it's only halfway done makes him sick.

So instead they finish the crib. And even as they do, Dean realizes that hope is too good to be true.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter Six**

Dean packs his clothes in the morning. Sam makes a point of giving him his bank card, as well as packing up some of those baby things. The sun rises and Dean would rather go back to bed, but he hugs Sam before he leaves. "I'll be back before you know it."

"Yeah." Sam hands Dean a couple sheets of paper, printed with directions and Castiel's new address. "Give me a call when you arrive."

"Will do." Dean looks around the yard one more time. "Take care of it while I'm gone, alright? And call me if the new guy can't handle it."

"He used to do work for Bobby."

With that, they part ways. Dean tries to stay chipper until he knows that Sam can't see him sag in the front seat.

The drive will take two days, three if Dean takes his time. Apparently this whole time Castiel has been living with some dude in Seattle. Sam assured him that there's a great neonatal unit in a hospital there - later, Dean had to look up the work _neonatal_. Babies are complicated.

It's nice to be on the road alone again. Lonely, but nice.

He and Castiel talked briefly on the phone last night. The whole thing was so terse and business-like - yes, he would feel better if Dean were close-by, and no, his roommate wouldn't mind. There was plenty of room. Castiel expected it wouldn't be much longer before it all fell apart, but he told Sam that he wasn't worried.

On one hand, Dean feels bad for lying to Sam. Sam's not stupid, he has to know that Castiel has doubts. On the other hand, he wants Sam to have that hope. Let Sam hold onto enough hope for all of them.

Dean fishes one-handed through the tapes scattered on the passenger seat before finally settling on one of his old Metallica tapes. The wire for Sam's iPod still hangs out of the stereo. Dean plays like he still hates it, but whenever he looks at it, it reminds him that Sam can grow without him.

That said, without Sam he can turn the radio all the way up. The wind rushes past the open windows, the music is loud, and something in his stomach pops. Once, then again and again and _wait a second_...

He laughs. Despite all the doom and gloom and impossibility of it all, he presses a hand to his abdomen and laughs as the baby pops around again. "Well, at least you have good taste."

* * *

Dean makes it to Castiel's apartment building just a little after lunch on Sunday. It's not his first visit to Seattle (once for a standard salt-and-burn, once for a rogue werewolf) but he's pleasantly surprised to see that Castiel lives in a fairly respectable neighborhood, if in a scuzzy college sort of way. There's a park not far down the street, and the building has a small lobby with a little buzzer. The label next to the button for 6E says "Underwood/Novak."

Dean has to buzz twice before an unfamiliar voice comes over the tinny speaker: "Yeah?"

"Is Cas in? He's expecting me."

"Oh, Dean, right? Yeah, he's not here. Come on up."

Dean opens the door when it screeches. Beyond it his options are a small elevator or some stairs - he opts for the elevator. Most of his bags are still in the Impala, but he has a backpack that Sam loaded with his laptop. (_I've been meaning to get a new one anyway_, he said when Dean protested.)

When he knocks on the door, the roommate yells, "Come in!"

The apartment reminds him of the apartment Lisa had when they were 19. It's not as small, but it has the inherent untidiness of people who rank picking up only slightly above torture on their to-do list. He's seen closets bigger than the kitchen. The furniture is mismatched and faded with age.

The sliding glass doors out onto a deck are open; the roommate is sitting with his feet up on a two-person patio table. He's rolling a cigarette from a bag of loose-leaf tobacco, and he waves in greeting when he sees Dean.

"Dean," Dean says, setting his bag on the floor behind the couch.

"Luke." He gestures to the empty chair. "Come on out; beer's in the fridge if you want one."

"No, but thanks." Dean does help himself to a glass of water (though he checks, and Castiel buys shitty beer). The roommate is maybe mid-twenties, and has an obvious layer of blond stubble framing a sharp face. If he didn't have a ponytail, he could almost look respectable. "So, you work with Cas?"

"Yeah." Luke licks the edge of the rolling paper to seal the cigarette, and lights up. He blows the smoke away from Dean. "Library on campus - people love Cas. He said you guys go way back."

"Yup."

Luke lets his cigarette hang from one hand. "Was it a church thing? Cas is all hush-hush about that church shit. I mean, Daphne would be some big secret if I hadn't met her on accident - and no offense, but he didn't mention you before, 'Hey, I have a buddy crashing with us'."

"Uh, not really a church thing," Dean replies. "Daphne?"

"Oh, yeah. She's, like, one of those friends that every dude has. That cute one you totally want to get with, but she's always ambiguously unavailable. Mine's named Ella." He takes a drag off his cigarette and squints up at the clouds like he's reading a sign. "They might be dating now, I'm not sure. So, not a church thing?"

Dean only allows himself a second of panic at the idea that Castiel might be dating before he shakes it away. He remembers Castiel's lackluster interest in boobs. "We worked together, uh, years ago. Long before Seattle."

"Cool." Luke has one of those big, charismatic grins that always makes Dean uncomfortable. "So, you gotta tell me what Cas is short for."

Dean nearly squirts his water through his noise. Instead, he coughs his way into a laugh. "You don't know?"

"Nah, he won't say. Our boss didn't even know it was a nickname until he let slip one day that you gave it to him. We've got bets. I'm bettin' he was named after Butch Cassidy, but the other popular vote is Casper." Luke shifts him a sideways glance and chuckles. "You could win me a lot of money with a little nod here, Dean."

"I'm not ruining it for him." Dean laughs again. "So where is he, anyway?"

"Daphne, maybe. What time is it?" Luke peers into the apartment, squinting at the readout on the DVD player. "Nah, church is out. Not sure, but he said he'd bring home pizza, so I wouldn't worry."

"No big deal. He's a grown man." Dean wonders what else he doesn't know about Castiel anymore. He yawns, the stiffness of sitting in the car for days hitting him all at once. The deck is sunny and even a little unseasonably warm. He could doze off right here if he stays long enough. "Anywhere in particular I should put my stuff?"

"Oh, Cas said to set up in his room. Door on the left at the end of the hall. You need a hand?"

"Nah, I've just got a duffel. Thanks, though. Good to meet you."

"Sure thing." Luke gives him a little psuedo-salute with the stub of his cigarette between his index and middle fingers. Dean sort of waves before heading down to the car to get his bag.

He leaves the bag of baby stuff tucked under the false bottom of the truck, along with two handguns and a bag of rock salt.

Castiel's room has a double bed in one corner and a twin mattress in the other - the mattress is wrapped in plastic with a price tag stuck on, with a sheet set piled on top. Dean settles in, unwrapping the mattress and making the bed. The sheets are stiff and smell of chemical packaging, but the bed is comfortably firm. He steals a pillow off of Castiel's bed and sprawls out on his back. The baby must shift, guessing from the little twitch of motion. Sam had gleefully informed him the other day that the baby is probably about six inches long, because apparently Sam keeps track of that sort of thing.

Dean taps on his abdomen with one finger. "Get used to these trips, kid. Never met a Winchester who could settle for long."

Except, maybe he'd like to break the tradition of the roaming family. He certainly doesn't want to raise another hunter.

He taps out a quick text message: Arrived safely. Nothing to report.

With that done, he considers his options before pulling out Sam's laptop. He's not terribly keen to go sit out with Luke, and besides - he ought to do some reading now that he doesn't have Sam to keep him up to date on this pregnancy.

* * *

Dean perks up from an hour of reading about premature babies and surgical delivery at the sound of the door and the smell of pizza. He sets the computer aside and goes out to see Castiel clearing a spot on the table for two boxes of pizza and - "Oh, did you seriously bring _pie_?"

Castiel smiles. Dean returns it. Luke snores on the couch.

"I thought you would like something a little familiar," Castiel says, gathering plates from the kitchen. "Have you been here long?"

"Not long at all." Dean digs in to the pizza and eyes the apple pie where Castiel sets it on the counter.

They walk out onto the deck together. The evening air is chilly but crisp, and the table is clear. Dean eats half a slice of his pizza, suddenly starving, before he strikes up conversation. "So, I hear no one knows your name."

Castiel shrugs. He eats as though he had been doing it all his life, folding his pizza slice in half and taking large bites. "I didn't want to explain it." He sets the plate aside and roots around on the bag of tobacco that Luke left out until he retrieves a rolled cigarette. With the cigarette between his lips, he pulls a half-used pack of matches from his pocket.

"So, you're a smoker now?"

Castiel lights up with his eyes focused on the end of the cigarette. "When the mood strikes." He sounds very human, and too familiar for Dean's comfort. "Angels do not feel substances the way humans do - now that I can have the experience, I enjoy the occasion."

"How occasionally?"

Castiel answers with a wry smile. "Can I get you another slice of pizza?"

Dean can see an evasion when it's in front of him - he's been manufacturing enough of them in the last several months. "Yeah; I haven't eaten this much since I was twelve, I swear. I shot up two feet that summer."

"I believe it." Castiel goes back inside long enough to bring back the whole box.

Dean clears his throat. "So, I felt the baby move."

The smile that Castiel gives him doesn't reach his eyes - if anything, he looks heartbroken. "What's it like?"

"Weird. Little pops. Seems healthy, though. Stronger than I expected."

Instead of saying anything, Castiel smokes.

"Luke said you go to church?"

"I did not stop having faith in my Father, just because he lost faith in me." Castiel stares out into over the horizon, where the sun is setting behind tall buildings; he takes an absent bite of his dinner.

Keeping his voice as neutral as possible, Dean adds, "And that you have a friend named Daphne."

Castiel tilts his head when he looks at Dean, his eyebrow twitched up in surprise. It's strange, seeing the difference in him now that they were on his home turf. Dean hadn't realized how much Castiel was playing the part of his old self, until the illusion was gone. Or maybe this was new, a manifestation of Castiel's lost light. Finally, he says, "I don't expect you'll meet Daphne. You know. Church." He looks away again; he seems to have lost interest in his food. "Is there anything I can do to make this more comfortable?"

"It's fine," Dean says. He reaches out to pat Castiel's arm absently, but Castiel leans away from his touch. Oh. Fine, right. Dean drew that line in the sand the second he had been _him_ again. He had no business being surprised when it worked. "Really, thanks."

"It's no problem. If you'll excuse me." Dean watches furtively while Castiel wakes Luke long enough to ask a question.

Dean looks away from the apartment as though he can turn a blind eye to the fact that Castiel is human - and as a human, Castiel is drowning.

He instead finishes his pizza and brings the box inside. He doesn't have the appetite for pie; the pizza gave him wicked heartburn anyway. After a long hot shower, Dean heads straight to Castiel's bedroom. His stuff has been moved to the larger bed.

Castiel reads a book on the twin, with the window open behind him. "I didn't mean to put you on the floor," he says when Dean enters. He's calmer, and Dean recognizes the smell of pot, even when it's just the hint. He can't cast stones; it's not like he hadn't had done his share of coping over a joint. Shit, before this baby nonsense, Dean would have gladly joined in. "I would be a terrible host if I did."

"It's no big deal." Dean sits on the edge of the bed and tosses his towel into a pile of laundry in the corner. "I don't mind."

"But I do - humor me, please, just once."

_That's not fair_, but Dean nods. "Okay. So, what should I do while I'm here?"

Castiel shrugs, staring at Dean's midsection hungrily. "Hope?" He makes his way across the short distance between beds on his knees. Dean's breath hitches, and Castiel presses a hand to Dean's stomach, gone just a bit smooth and round in the last couple weeks. Castiel closes his eyes and inhales, but when his hand falls away he's disappointed. "I can't connect to it."

"It's not a computer."

"But I could before," Castiel says in earnest. "Before, if I worried or had a bad feeling, I could just _feel_ that it was alright. Now I can't feel anything." He retreats back to his book.

Dean rearranges the bed, moving his bag and computer to the floor before laying down. It's not late, but he's exhausted in every way possible. He closes his eyes and inhales the scent of the pillows. "What about when this whole thing goes down? How do you want to go from there?"

The laugh from Castiel's side of the room may as well be a recording from Dean's nightmares. "You're being optimistic, Dean. I haven't had the luxury of optimism for a long time. I assume when this all ends, we'll go back to where we started."

_Alone_, Dean finishes and rolls over to get some sleep.

* * *

Somehow, Dean sleeps through the night; he wakes up alone in the bedroom with a dull grey light coming in through the blinds. Yawning, he stretches and lays in bed for a while. When he was on the road, the idea of crashing with Castiel hadn't seemed so bad - sort of like a vacation, really. He had never taken a vacation before.

Vacations suck. He doesn't know if he can taken another 20 weeks of last night. On top of that, the apartment is freezing - the nights are getting colder and lasting longer.

Eventually his growling stomach gets him out of bed, and he finds the pie still on the counter, with a note in messy handwriting on top: _Luke, don't eat this._ He snickers and cuts himself a slice of that bad boy. Apple. Hell yeah.

"Seriously, you suppose I could get in on that?"

Dean turns on his heel to see Luke sitting on the porch again. "Do you live out there? Was that door open all night?" Despite his complaining, Dean brings out an extra slice for Luke.

Luke shrugs. "Sometimes. I'm not going to lie; I was more baked than this pie last night." He laughs to himself.

Dean rolls his eyes. The pie is great - it's sweet and syrupy and perks him right up.

"You want some coffee or something? There's this place around the corner where I usually get some before class. And, I don't know what you're going to do around here all day. Unless you're into XBox. In which case, I envy your open schedule."

Ben had an XBox, but all the games had been boring and non-violent; the one time a cashier talked Dean into buying a first person shooter, Lisa nearly lost it. "Sure. What are you studying?"

"Chemical engineering."

"Seriously?"

"Honest to god." Luke hums in appreciation with the next bite of his pie. "Cas said you were going to be here for a few months - what's the scoop?"

Dean spears a particularly large piece of apple with his fork and chews it slowly, relishing the cinnamon. "It's a family thing," he says finally.

"Cas has family?"

"Cas has me."

Luke snorts. "Tone it down, Rambo. I've got you pegged, you know - you scream 'soldier' with everything from your duffel bag to that whole weird macho thing you're doing." He indicates _that whole weird macho thing_ with a strange little wave of his hand. "Cas does it too, though I can't put my finger on the what. I'm guessing intelligence or something."

"That's how he gets you. Cas is a surprisingly tough soldier; he devoted his life to it. Loved it."

"Worked together, then?"

"Yup." He finishes his pie and debates another slice. His stomach knots up, and the baby flutters. Maybe not more pie. Coffee, definitely.

Luke licks his plate and goes about lighting up another cigarette from his messy tobacco bag. "Discharged, I gather; he's got a discharged in disgrace feel about him."

Dean doesn't want to talk about it anymore, and not with Luke. Dean still can't shake this possessive feeling when he realizes that Castiel has built a normal life without him. He shouldn't feel possessive of Castiel, as though he has some claim to him. "So, coffee?"

"Yeah. Let me get dressed."

Dean dresses in jeans - getting less wearable by the day, it seems - and closes the deck doors before they leave. He jams his hands in his jacket pockets and follows alongside Luke, who pulls the hood of his sweater up.

The morning is bright and busy; they're by no means the first people in the coffee shop, even though the clock in the shop reveals that it's just after 9 AM.

"Hi, Luke," the girl behind the register says. She's pretty in a young way, with her hair up in the ponytail and her shirt cut to reveal ample cleavage. Dean can't bring himself to enjoy the view. "The usual?"

"And a black coffee." Dean pulls his wallet from his pocket. "I've got it," he adds to Luke. The bank card Sam supplied him with runs without a problem. The novelty hasn't worn off yet, when he's used to credit cards that shut off without notice. They settle at a table by the door. "So, where is this library you and Cas work at?"

"On campus." Luke's coffee has whipped cream piled on top; he slurps at it with all the glee of a child with ice cream. "This is great, having someone who knows Cas around. You're like Google with specialized knowledge."

"You know him."

"Nah, I just live with him. I mean, we party together; he's cool. Give me another couple years and I'd say I knew him."

This cheers Dean. Like he has something a little special.

"So, who is Claire? He won't say."

Dean considers the question carefully. He doesn't know a lot about Claire; he hasn't given her a second of thought since they left her and her mother back in Pontiac. That seems more wrong now than it did before. They had been saving the world. Now he was just a dude with a child who would share half of Claire's genes. He shivers.

"We..."

Luke watches expectantly. He believes that they served in the military.

Dean rolls with it. "We served with a guy named Jimmy. Claire is his daughter."

"Ah - Cas talks about how he ruined her life. Like, a lot, when he's drunk or whatever."

Dean remembers the look of that girl when Castiel rode her body. "He might have."

"Harsh."

"No. He never hurt her, but her dad didn't fare so well."

"You guys were in some serious shit then."

"Yeah." He thinks back on Lucifer and the angels and all those souls from Purgatory ripping Castiel's body apart. He thinks of Bobby dying in the backlash of that ceremony. He thinks of all his time in Hell and watching Sam leap into Lucifer's cage. He's sitting in a café, and he swears he can feel Alistair's breath on his neck.

Dean exhales it away, a whole life that feels completely disconnected from his reality. "We were in some serious shit."

Luke checks the clock by the register. "My bus gets here soon, but if you want to come along, I can show you were the library is. No one will mind if you swing in and visit Cas."

"Sure." Dean throws away his coffee, still half full, and follows along through a throng of students at the bus stop. When the bus arrives, they pack in and stand close.

Luke's breath is all coffee and smoke, entirely too near when he asks, "Do you and Cas have some don't-ask-don't-tell thing going?"

Dean winces. "Not really, no."

"Just wondering."

The bus doesn't take long to arrive on campus, and Luke points him straight down the road. "Keep walking until you see it. Big building. It sort of exudes the feeling of books."

Dean heads down the sidewalk, avoiding the people milling from building to building. He's been on campuses before, and never liked the feel of so many people close together. It's what he hates about cities; there's too many hiding places, too many ways for the monsters to blend into the crowd.

Not that Dean hunts monsters anymore.

The library looms, easily the largest building on the block. Dean enters without the first idea of where he's headed. He hadn't thought to ask where exactly Castiel would be working, so he pulls out his phone and dials.

Castiel answers after a few rings, a little breathless, "Are you okay?"

"I'm in library. Where are you?"

"I thought you - " Castiel stops and takes a deep breath. "Why are you at the library?"

Dean should have a good answer for this. _I wanted to see you_ might work, or _I missed you_ would make his stance a lot more clear. "Luke and I got coffee. He suggested it. It's not like I had anything else to do."

"Unfortunately, my hands are literally full. I can meet you for lunch at 11:30."

He'll take the compromise. At least on campus he can look at college girls. "Sure. Give me a call." It's hard to remember, sometimes, that people don't like having their regular work hours interrupted. Just another thing that makes civilian life so inconvenient. It's too regimented.

He heads back outside to soak up the bright morning sun, settling on a bench out not far from the library. Girls still travel in packs; it's been years since he was young enough to actually fit in on a campus, and that still hasn't changed. It's a stroke to his ego that at least three girls give him the second glance and the shy smile - whatever else is happening to him, he's still got it.

The baby pops around a bit low in his abdomen. _Right._ Just because no one can see it, doesn't mean he's not a freak.

"You've got a weird life ahead of you," Dean says aloud. No one spares the weird dude talking to himself a second glance. "Normal kids with two dads at least have an egg donor somewhere."

There's no movement in response, and he reminds himself that it doesn't mean anything. It's still to early for regular movement.

"It's not like I don't know all about not having a mom, either. Your g - " He chokes on the word, on the very idea. It's too soon for those kinds of labels, too wrong that his mother was long cold before she could be a grandmother. "My mom was a model mother, what I knew of her. Maybe it'll be easier for you. You won't have a mom to miss."

He folds his hands in his lap, pointedly not touching his abdomen. Not here, not now, not when people might wonder. _Wonder what? If you have indigestion? _

"Not true," he says finally. "Sorry I even said it."

* * *

Castiel meets him in the food court at the union; he looks more anxious than pleased, but he smiles as he sits down across from Dean. "I'm sorry to make you wait."

"It's fine. I shouldn't have come up unannounced." Dean means it. Nearly four hours walking around by himself helped him come to the conclusion that Castiel deserves better than his frustrated hostility. Sure, _some_ of this is Castiel's fault. About half of it. But that doesn't mean that he has a free pass to be a douche.

They get their food without speaking; as it turns out, Castiel still loves burgers, and they order a truly dismaying amount of them. Dean snacks on some fries as they walk back to the table.

"You're getting along with Luke, I gather," Castiel says as he unwraps his first burger.

"Yeah. He seems to think we were in the military together."

Castiel laughs, his face lighting up. "We were in battle. The military is easier to explain than the truth."

"That's what I thought." Dean eats while he considers his next question. He almost doesn't want to say it aloud, but he has to. If this baby actually happens, its something that has to be addressed. "What - um, whatever happened to Jimmy?"

All the blood seems to drain from Castiel's face in an instant, the amusement gone. He sets his burger aside, half-eaten.

"It's just that Luke mentioned Claire, and I realized I don't know. Is this kid going to be related to her? I mean, genetically."

"I assume so." Castiel leans back in his chair and exhales. "Jimmy has been dead for a long time. I'm sorry, I didn't think you would want to know."

Dean doesn't know how he should feel about the news. He felt for Jimmy, back when they were keeping the guy from his family against his will. But it would be stupid to act like Jimmy being alive was a better option, not after all these years and all the abuse Castiel has endured. "I'm sorry. It can't be easy for you."

"It's not," Castiel snaps. "You don't - "

"Cas!"

Dean and Castiel look over at almost the exact same moment.

The woman waves as she weaves between tables; she smiles and apologizes at almost every table as she makes her way over. Castiel raises his hand in a sort of wave and flashes Dean a significant look. Dean doesn't manage to decipher it before the woman arrives at the table and leans over to kiss Castiel.

Oh.

Dean flushes and looks directly into his food, even though his appetite has disappeared very suddenly. _Jealousy. Right._ This isn't how he acts; he didn't freak out when Lisa moved on after they broke up - there's no reason to get mad when Castiel has moved on too.

It takes him a second to realize that he's heard his name. He looks up to find both Castiel and the woman watching him. She's pretty; more mature than Dean has ever preferred his flings, which only makes her look like a more serious relationship than a fling. "Sorry? I zoned out." He smiles like he always smiles when he's uncomfortable. Just charm his way out of the situation, then he can retreat to lick his wounds.

She laughs. "Oh, I understand. I was just saying that you must be Dean - Cas told me you were staying with him for a while. I'm Daphne." She holds out her hand, and Dean shakes it.

"Yeah, I'm Dean. Good to meet you, Daphne. Cas mentioned you, but I've blanked. Professor?"

Daphne has a smile that could light a city block, and Dean's willing to bet she's the sweetest woman in this joint. Because she would have to be sweet. She was probably the opposite of Dean in every way - devoted, open, kind. "Yes, religious studies. I was actually just passing through when I saw Cas here." She turns to Castiel with nothing but fondness on her face. "Are we still on for dinner tonight?"

"Yes," Castiel says.

They kiss again, and Dean goes back to studying the texture of his fries. He chews on one, but he seems to have lost all sense of taste.

When she's gone, Castiel says, "Thank you for - "

"Not a problem." He stands and wipes his hands on his jeans. "I'll get out of your hair." He knows he's not keeping his cool nearly as well as he should, but he would call it an admirable effort. He just keeps reminding himself that there's no use in getting mad.

"Dean - "

"See you back at the apartment."

* * *

Dean calls Sam three times on the bus, because he's enough of an adult to know when he needs to blow off some steam. He just hangs up each time it goes to voicemail.

The apartment is empty, and there are no cars to fix, and Dean is so _angry_ that he wants to start throwing shit through windows. Instead he sits out the porch and eats another slice of pie. And maybe throws the fork off the side when no one is looking, as hard and fast as he can.

After an hour of staring at nothing and reviewing in his head over and over the things he would say if he weren't so terminally afraid of his feelings, Dean starts cleaning. It's not that he likes cleaning. It's just the closest thing Castiel's apartment has to fixing an engine.

He finds three different bongs in the living room, which he sets on the kitchen counter. At this point, it seems to be even odds as to whether they belong to Luke or Cas. There's a Whitman's box full of pot and other supplies under the couch that he doesn't move.

It's after dusk when someone finally comes home - Luke and four other people. "Holy shit," a girl says, looking around so quickly that her hair bounces around her face. "Are we in the wrong place or did you hire a fucking housekeeper?"

"No." Luke catches sight of Dean on deck and goes, "What up, soldier. You a maid too?"

"No." Dean taps out his seventh text message to Sam. "Don't get used to it."

"Right-o. We brought back booze. You in?"

For a split second Dean almost forgets that he's currently hosting a parasite that's systematically ruining everything about his life. "Can't, sorry. Sobriety."

The word reminds him of the twine, so constant against his skin that he'd stopped thinking about it for months now. It yanks off with a brief snap. He then leans over to slide the door closed and settles a hand over where he imagines the baby rests. "Sorry."

It's after nine when Sam finally calls - Luke and his friends are playing a loud music game in the living room, laughing like every moment is a riot, and Castiel is still nowhere to be seen. In Dean's head, he's having the most romantic sex of all time.

"Is everything okay?" Sam asks. "What's going on?"

Dean excuses himself to Castiel's room, which just hits that exposed anger that he's been nursing since lunch. "Cas is dating!"

"I - What?" The tension leaves Sam's voice and instead he lets out a little breath. "I though you were dying or something. This is about Cas _dating_?"

"Yeah. He's got this girlfriend - Daphne. I met her today. What am I even doing here?"

"Trying to keep your baby alive." Sam sucks in a quiet breath - not quiet enough, he's getting rusty now that they're not doing field work anymore. "What does it matter if he's dating?"

"Don't try to fucking bait me, Sam, I know your conversation tricks."

"I'm just saying, what's the big deal?"

"I didn't date!"

"He didn't cheat on you, Dean."

Dean hangs up, because Sam was supposed to be on his side.

It's been a while since Dean has smoked, but the smell is wafting through the apartment and right now he wants _anything_ to take the edge off his nerves. This is just another way that Castiel is wrecking his life.

He slams a window open and sets a box fan in the window to blow the air out.

Sam sends him a text message. _Don't overreact._

Dean deletes it.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven**

After what Dean dubs The Hot-for-Teacher Incident, Castiel doesn't come back to the apartment. For two weeks. When Dean asked after a couple days, he said, "Nah, it's cool, he's crashing with Daphne. Something about space."

Instead of dwelling on it, Dean found Luke's XBox and learned how to play _Call of Duty_ online. It was the first time he'd been called a cocksucker by a thirteen-year-old girl.

What he does is look into families. He considers finding Amelia and Claire, except how sick would it be to call up Amelia to tell her that her husband is dead but his body has gone on procreating. It's cold, even by Dean's standards.

He can't call an agency - _Hey, I'm a pregnant dude and I think my baby deserves a real family._ - and he can't just contact a family with that information either. Eventually, he decides to roll with the law for once; if he takes the baby to the ER within the first three days, they'll find it a home. It's not a perfect solution, but it appears to be the least-questions-asked method.

Dean prefers to avoid tricky questions.

Eventually Castiel comes back like nothing was wrong, and they fall into a comfortable routine of not talking to each other. They share a room each night without saying a word. Their child begins to move in earnest with each day, and Dean doesn't say a word.

Right on schedule his phone chimes, and Dean hunkers his character behind a wall as he checks it. _Welcome to week 28. It's your third trimester._ It seems wrong to pretend that he intends to keep the baby, but he doesn't want lectures or guilt trips. He just wants to make a plan and stick with it.

He rearranges the blanket wrapped around his shoulders and goes back to shooting things in the face to work off his frustration.

_It's for the best_, he tells both himself and the baby when it shifts inside him. Whatever else is fucking wrong with his life, the baby is thriving and growing and alive. At least his body can manage to do this one thing right. _You deserve a better family than me._

He shakes his head to clear his thoughts and gets back into the game, just in time to get shot in the back of the head.

"Morning, Winchester," Luke says from behind the couch. "How are the troops?"

"I think this dude just threatened to fuck me in the ear," Dean says, pulling the headset down over his neck. "These people are vicious."

"Online gaming is serious business. Hey, are you cool with me throwing a party next weekend? I'm overdue for a truly legendary one."

"It's your house. You coming for coffee?"

"Nah," Luke says.

Those are apparently the magic words to break the truce with Castiel, because he chimes in, "I could use some coffee."

Fucking Saturday mornings. Dean looks over his shoulder to where Castiel is standing in the hallway, already dressed for the day. "Sure, let me put some real clothes on." He disconnects from the game; undoubtedly he'll have plenty of pissed off messages when he logs back on. When he stands the blanket drops into a pile on the couch behind him.

"Winchester," Luke says as he climbs over the back of the couch, "your manly military physique isn't standing up to the rigors of the XBox."

Dean pulls his t-shirt down over what apparently looks like a gut to people who don't know. "I'll start PT in the spring." He would probably need the distraction by then anyway.

"Attaboy - hibernation is good for you!" Luke takes over the controller. Castiel leans against the wall in the hall, his gaze intent as Dean heads back to the bedroom.

At this point in his pregnancy, the best Dean can do is rig his jeans too low on his hips to avoid the growing midsection, and wear the biggest shirts he owns. He pulls a hoody on for good measure - his jacket has long since given up on closing around him. He doesn't know how anyone can look at him and see anything but a pregnant dude, but he's glad that they don't notice.

He and Castiel walk down to the coffee shop in silence. They order their coffee and take two armchairs in the corner before Castiel finally speaks. "We cannot continue this silence for three more months."

"I don't - "

"You decided this." Castiel leans forward and close to Dean. His hair is mussed, and there's a fine layer of stubble covering his cheeks. He sets his mug of tea on the table. "I didn't ask for miracles, I just asked you to turn around and look at me. You could not even offer me that. I wasn't going to wait forever. I do not have forever to wait."

Dean remembers the moment just fine, but he doesn't care for the reminder. No one had warned him that it was a turning point. "Do you have any idea how weird this is for me?"

"No," Castiel says, frustration evident in his voice. "I do not understand how the state of your genitals has changed anything between us, because it clearly hasn't. But I'm sorry that you're hurt. I did not intend it."

Dean shakes his head and looks out the window. If ever there was a time to tell Castiel that he intends to give up their baby, this is it. "It's fine. You're an adult, Cas, and I've made my peace with the thing. I just don't have anything to say. Nothing has changed."

"Look at yourself." Castiel leans back, grabbing his tea and taking a sip. "Everything has changed. I barely recognize you sometimes."

Dean shrugs. He's gotten lethargic, and he knows it. The longer he gets into this pregnancy, the more out of touch with himself he feels. At the worst of times, he considers the possibility that this will never end and he will never be the same. No, scratch that - at the worst of times he just wishes the worst would happen, that whatever was left of Castiel's grace would unravel within him and kill this thing now, before it gets more complicated. He places a hand over his abdomen, but the baby rarely moves in the morning. "Yeah. Me too."

Castiel heaves a long sigh. "Daphne is coming over for dinner tonight; she's really wanted to meet you, and I've held her off for as long as I can. Are you going to be okay through this?"

_No_, Dean wants to say, except that he finds he's gone numb to the idea of her. His world is on pause until he's got this baby somewhere safe and sound, as far from himself as possible. "Yeah. It'll be nice to get to know the future Mrs. Holy Tax Accountant." He knows he's taken it just a step too far when he says it, sees the flash of anger behind Castiel's eyes and just can't bring himself to regret it. At least he knows that Castiel is feeling something.

At least there's nothing left to say.

* * *

"Are you sure that you don't want to stay?" Castiel asks as Luke pulls on his shoes. "We've ordered plenty of take-out."

"Ha, are you kidding? I want to be as far from whatever this is as possible. Add one more wheel to this dinner and it'll drive right off. I'll be back later. Good luck, Winchester!"

"What, you think I can't handle a couple of love-struck professors?" Dean waggles his eyebrows and pulls Castiel's bedroom door closed, hiding the laundry thrown in at the last minute.

"Your funeral, man. Good luck gentlemen." Luke opens the door, and then laughs. "Speak of the angel herself, good evening, Daphne. The boys just finished cleaning up."

"Running off again, Luke?" she says, her smile teasing. "Don't have too much fun."

Luke closes the door with a flourish.

Castiel moves to the door to greet her. "Let me get that," he says as he takes her coat and kisses her cheek.

Even from where he's standing in the hallway, Dean can see her flush. The dinner is supposed to be casual, but even in casual wear she's pretty, her jeans well-fitted and her blouse bright and flowing.

She catches his eye as Castiel hangs her coat on the rack. "Dean! I'm so glad to see you again." She walks toward him, and he meets her halfway; she turns his intended hand-shake into a hug, and he finds himself praying that the baby won't move at just the wrong moment. "I'm sorry it's been so long."

"Oh, please, it's been all me," Dean replies with an easy smile. Just like flirting with a mark, with the charm turned down. He's puffy and swollen anyway; even with the charm turned up to eleven, he probably wouldn't have much luck. "The food just arrived, if you're ready to eat."

"Famished." She goes into the kitchen and moves like she knows the place; when Castiel joins her, they work like a unit. Dean sits at the freshly-cleaned table and watches.

As much as Dean wants to believe that there's just convenience or attraction between the two, there's really something there. Castiel says something, and she laughs. Castiel smiles with warmth in his eyes, kisses her forehead and helps her carry out the plates.

They look like they could be a family. Castiel may be scruffy and a bit worse for wear, but maybe with more time - maybe by the time the baby comes - he'll be in a better place. With her.

"So, Dean," she says, sounding all the world like a mother talking to a child's new friend, "I hear that you and Cas served together for a couple years."

"Yeah, sort of." Dean chews a large bite of his noodles, suddenly starving at the sight of food. He's going to have heartburn in an hour, but the spicy noodles and beef are so worth it. "I was just reserves, you see; Cas served a lot longer before I even got there. But we got injured on the same mission, and, well, we just stuck together after that."

Castiel shoots him a look and clears his throat. "We're not supposed to talk about it," he says softly to Daphne. "But Dean was a skilled and valuable soldier."

"So I've been told. Cas speaks well of you, Dean."

Dean looks up his plate. "Really?" He tries to meet Castiel's eyes, but Castiel has taken to staring down at his dinner.

"Of course; you saved his life, from what he's told me. I never saw him so excited as when he told me you were coming to stay. Are you guys planning to get a larger place?"

Dean shrugs. "I don't think I'll be staying too much longer. My brother has been running the family business back home without me. He's good, but I miss the work."

"Oh, Cas, you didn't tell me that." She reaches out and touches his arm, as though the news is much worse than all that.

Castiel sips his cheap beer and shrugs. "It was inevitable. I didn't expect him to squeeze in here forever."

"And Cas has been so gracious about sharing his space. I can only impose for so long. He has a life to get on with. No one wants the past to follow them forever."

Castiel closes his eyes momentarily, as though warding off a headache, and dives back into his dinner with renewed gusto.

Dean does the same, though they both answer whatever questions Daphne asks, and contribute to whatever it is she has to say. For as frustrated as Dean is, he can't help but liking her. She's warm and engaging, and the longer she talks, the more Dean thinks that maybe she's it. Maybe she was meant to have this kid all along.

The baby stretches inside him, and Dean wishes he had anything other than his own instinct to run on here. With one hand settled just under his shirt, he feels the slight shift of weight from one side of the other. It seems like all the weight of the baby can fit against his hand, even though it's just a sort of lump. A sharp pain hits him, like the baby hit some nerve as it moved.

Castiel excuses himself to the porch for a cigarette; the door scrapes as it shuts. Dean clears his throat and pulls his hand away, the pain forgotten. He stands to get himself some more noodles. "Do you want kids, Daphne? Or more food?"

"Can you bring the rice and chicken, please?" She stands to help him carry the boxes, and serves herself as Dean sits. "As for children - yes, when I'm married and settled. It's surprisingly difficult to balance family and dating when you have to deal with college students." She laughs, and Dean follows suit because he assumes it's supposed to be funny. He doesn't know anything about college students, other than Sam was once one and they will sell just about anything at embarrassingly low prices. "Do you?"

He finds the question odd – that she might be genuinely curious about his feelings. The whole setup is strange, as he sits there and eats dinner with his baby daddy's girlfriend. "Yeah, actually. I didn't think I did, until I had this stepson."

"Oh, you were married?"

"No." Dean shifts; the baby follows suit. It's hard to ignore the baby when it moves so often within him. He clears his throat. "It didn't work out between his mom and I."

"I'm sorry to hear that."

Dean turns all his focus onto his dinner. "How did you meet Cas?"

"Oh, the library. He has a lot of knowledge of religious texts. It was nice to have someone to talk to about work." Her voice is filled with pleasure. "Then it turned out we were attending the same church at different times. It just felt sort of like divine intervention putting us in the right place at the right time."

"I get that." Dean focuses on drinking his water, overwhelmed by how far he'd taken this. He can certainly imagine her with Castiel's child. "He's really at ease with you."

"Thank you." She sets her fork aside and leans forward. "You must care for him quite a bit."

Dean shakes his head and stands. It was bad enough that its obvious; hearing it from Castiel's girlfriend is really just too fucking much."Its no big deal. We're just friends."

* * *

Dean's restless and exhausted when he tries to fall asleep later. In the other room Luke has his music up too loud to cover up the fact that he's got his girlfriend over. It just reminds Dean, with every thump of the bass and growl of the singer, that Luke isn't the only person in the apartment with a girlfriend. Feeling safe in the dark, he rolls onto his side and asks Castiel, "Do you want to keep it?"

He can see where Castiel lays stretched out on his mattress. He always sleeps on his stomach, and right now he has his head turned toward Dean. "Clearly," he says, his voice flat. "We've gone through a lot of effort to keep it so far."

At least he understands what Dean means, though he can't help the twinge of guilt that runs through him. "I mean _you_, specifically. I know I talked you into keeping it alive, but do you really want to be a dad?"

Castiel sits up. Even in the dark his eyes are too bright. "What do you mean?"

Dean rolls up on his side to avoid looking Castiel in the face. He's a coward; he always has been when it comes to real life. "Aside from living with Luke, you've got a relatively stable life going on here. It makes more sense for you and Daphne to adopt a stray, than it would for us to work out some complex custody thing."

The bed dips and Castiel turns him bodily with one hand on his shoulder. He's close and warm and Dean misses having him so close. He wants nothing more than to pull Castiel under the covers and keep him near. "Don't, Dean. You always make foolish decisions when you panic."

"What am I going to do with a baby at a scrap yard? Wear it on my back while I tear apart rusty old cars?"

"I don't believe for a minute that you're willing to walk away."

Dean clears his throat and swallows his indignation. "I've had some time to think it over. I don't think that I'm going to make a very good father."

"I don't want to do this without you."

Dean sits up on the bed to give them some sense of balance. "You've lived fine without me."

"You're not stupid," Castiel says. "I just manage to live."

The worst part is that Dean wants to believe that Castiel is just as lost as he is. That he's not the only one confused and lonely. Dean hates having him across the room - hates feeling so incomplete.

So Dean leans in to kiss him, as hesitant and wary as that first time, when he was a girl and lying about how it wasn't going to change anything.

Castiel tilts his face away before they meet. "Please don't ask this of me." He rubs his face with his hands and shakes his head. "I have to go."

"Don't."

But Castiel is out the door without another word.

* * *

Despite having looked six times, nothing inside the refrigerator has changed. Dean is still debating the merits of going out for something to eat when someone knocks on the door. He closes his robe surreptitiously and checks out the peep hole.

Sighing, he unbolts and opens the door. "Hi, Daphne," he says with a little forced cheer. It's not that he dislikes her; it's that he wasn't prepared for her. Looking at her reminds him that she will probably be a great mother, when he would only be a mediocre father. "Did you forget something?"

She's dressed nicely, in a knee-length skirt and modest top, and her hair pulled up from her face. "No, actually; I'm looking for Cas. Is he in? He missed church this morning." As if sensing Dean's hesitance, she holds up a drink carrier with four cups of coffee and a paper bag. "I brought breakfast."

"Let me check," Dean says. "Come on in." She breezes past him and sets breakfast on the table while he looks in the bedroom where he knows Castiel isn't. For good measure he bangs on Luke's door. "Cas in there?"

"Fuck off!"

He heads back into the living room. "Sorry; he must have gone out."

"Oh, I hope he's alright. I brought you and Luke coffee," she says as she sits across from him. "And turnovers. Cas loves turnovers, and Luke will eat anything. I didn't know if you had a preference."

"Um, food. My preference is food." It dawns on him that he's responsible for being social. She's opening up one of the coffees and blowing on it. Strands of hair escape her coif, framing her face in curly red strands. Fuck, but she really is pretty. He feels like Chuck, standing there with a tattered robe over his pyjamas. He shucks it off and tosses it over the back of the couch, then goes to get some plates from the kitchen. "Thanks, Daphne; I appreciate the thought. Do you need anything?"

"A fork would be lovely, thank you."

Dean pulls down the plates and notices for the first time an open shoebox on the counter. When he goes to close it he glances in it; the pot and papers and pipes don't surprise him. It's the little orange prescription bottles that throw him for a loop. _Xanax_ and _Percocet_ and _Ambien_, all labeled in Cas' tight, messy handwriting, marker over the white remains of the original labels.

Swallowing, he covers on the box, then grabs the plates and a fork for Daphne. "Sorry, lost my train of thought. I'm not much of a morning person."

"It's fine," she says as she takes the plate and fork. "Neither am I." They divvy out their large turnovers. She doesn't say anything else until she's eaten half of hers. It's too sudden, too nervous when she sets her fork down across the rim of her plate. "You don't like me."

Dean starts, his fingers sticky from his breakfast as he stares at her. He swallows slowly and wipes his hands on his pants. "That's not true."

"I'm not foolish. You're uncomfortable with me. It took Cas weeks to agree to us all having dinner together. I'd have to be blind not to see that there's some problem. You ask me questions like you're doing some sort of wellness exam."

"It's not you." He flounders for a handhold in a conversation that's rapidly moving beyond his control. "I just... Cas is complicated and - "

"You mean the drugs, right?"

"What?" He sits up as if caught red-handed, and wonders if he spoke aloud when he saw that box in the kitchen. "What do you - "

"I'm nice," she says, and she smiles because damn it, she really is. "Please don't mistake me for naive. Cas isn't as good at hiding his problems as he thinks he is."

_Well enough that I missed it_, or perhaps ignored it was more truthful. He cracks his knuckles and keeps his gaze on Daphne. "Is he getting worse?"

She swallows and looks down at her hands. "Yes, though I don't think he thinks so. We haven't spoken of it in so many words. I just encourage him to speak to our pastor, and he makes empty promises."

And Dean wonders who taught him that little maneuver. Maybe if Castiel had latched onto Sam, he would have been an easier human. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be." She straightens her shoulders. "I understand that this is so painfully stereotypical, me determined to fix him, but it's... More complex than all that. I love him. When we met, it really did feel right. I can see children and a home with him. Ugly minivans and ER trips at midnight. If that means getting him through this, then its worth it."

He look away, embarrassed and flustered by her emotion. He understands exactly what she means. "You really love him?"

"Yes. I always did like a challenge."

He almost tells her, right then. Not everything, not the hard things - just that there's a baby, and it could be her baby, Castiel's protests be damned. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have been so suspicious, I just... Castiel has been hurt before." No need to go into who did the hurting.

"I suspected so." The room fills with their silence, their coffee still mostly full and their breakfast suddenly much less appealing. He wonders what she's thinking, what powers the concern on her face. She clears her throat and stands suddenly. "I just thought we should clear the air - that if I told you how I felt, you could be more at ease with me. I do want to be friends with Cas' friends – with you. Please let Cas know that I'm looking for him, if he turns up."

"Sure thing. Thanks for stopping by."

She pops the lid on her coffee and sees herself out. Once the door closes behind her, Dean goes back to the shoebox and looks through the contents more carefully.

It's definitely Castiel's - there's no denying the way his letters are shaped, awkward and neat at the same time. If Dean is honest with himself, he knows that this was always an option. Even back when Castiel started falling during the Apocalypse, Dean had always waited for the day that he began to take self-medicating one step too far.

* * *

It's after sundown when Castiel returns. If Luke and his friends hadn't shouted, "Cas!" in eerily perfect unison, Dean would've missed it entirely. He sets his computer aside and arms himself with the box, headed out into the apartment just in time to see Castiel let himself out onto the deck. Dean grabs a sweatshirt on his way out, and pulls the blinds closed before he closes the door.

"Hello, Dean," Castiel says, as calm as when he was an angel. Instead of greeting him, Dean drops the shoebox onto the table. "Ah. I must have left that out."

"You can't live like that." Dean paces the small space between the empty chair and the railing. Cas opens the box and starts loading his pipe as though that's the _totally normal_ response to this situation. "The fuck?"

"I think this conversation is going to be long and difficult, and my buzz is wearing off."

"Don't - Don't be so fucking calm about this. This is a big deal!"

Castiel holds his lighter to the bowl and inhales deep. He holds for a moment, then blows the smoke upwards as he exhales, staring right into the cloud as though he can see something within it. "I am patient. Do not mistake that for calm."

Dean cracks his knuckles. The baby does some sort of weird hop-flip in his gut, and he tries to send it all the _seriously, not now_ vibes he can muster. "Daphne knows. If you don't give a shit about yourself, aren't you at least a little bothered about what this is like for her?"

Leaning his head back, Castiel sighs. "What do you want from me, Dean?"

"Excuse me?"

Cas takes another hit before setting the pipe aside. The light shines between the slats on the blinds, obscuring most of his expression. "I don't understand what you expect from me. You have made it clear that we are not a 'thing.' You are not my family. I don't see how you should care how I conduct my life or my relationships."

"You walked away too."

"From what - a brief respite before you changed your mind again? I can't keep letting you get my hopes up. I refuse."

"I was trying!"

"You always try!" Castiel stands and shakes his hands like he would rather take a swing at Dean than just stand there. "Being with you has just been another terrible thing to define the last year of my life - I have a _life_, Dean, do you understand how hard that is? What this year has been to me?"

Dean's hot with embarrassment and anger, and he isn't sure if he wants to shake Castiel or just hug him until he stops sounding so hurt. "How would I? It's not like you talk when there's trouble!"

"Let me catch you up, then." Castiel holds up an index finger. "I was banished from my home and removed from all my brothers." He holds up another finger. "I was tasked with telling a widow that while her husband's body lives on, his soul is gone. I stole a father from his child, literally the only person on Earth who could relate to the pain she's going to feel from having been my vessel." He holds up a third finger. "I foolishly let myself believe that if I loved you enough, that you would not give up on me."

"It wasn't about you!"

"Of course it was about me! I'm a man now, for better or worse. This is my reality, and it will not change." Castiel sits down like he's exhausted, like all the wind has gone from him, and takes another hit off his pipe. He turns away from the light and away from Dean. "Every day, I look at you and I wait for the moment when my grace is gone from you. That child is just another thing I cannot have."

Dean feels like Castiel has drawn all the energy from him. He sits and folds his hands over his stomach. Suddenly, he's not so bothered by the way the baby moves. "You don't know that."

Castiel laughs, low and humorless. "I'm a failure, Dean. I cannot make you see me, and I cannot help our child survive. Right now, all I can worry about is how I'll keep you alive when this all comes to pass. And I don't even know how I'll do that."

"I'm not helpless."

"No, you're not." Castiel looks at the shoebox longingly, his eyes lit from the light indoors. "I'm not used to _feeling_ so intensely. I hardly know how to hold it all in."

"You don't." Dean scoots the chair across the concrete; the metal screeches and protests, but he just gets close enough so that he can grab Castiel's hand. "I'm not the poster boy for emotional maturity, but you just - you have to find someone to unload on. No one can do it alone, Cas."

Castiel grips his hand. "You've always had Sam."

"And you have me." Dean licks his lips and swallows the doubt and the niggling part of his mind that still says, _this isn't you, this isn't how it's supposed to go_. Instead he leans in and breathes the pungent scent of smoke off Castiel. "Don't go down like this. Don't push me out, and I'll keep you close. We can scream at each other until everything feels normal again."

"We have no normal," Castiel whispers, his breath brushing Dean's lips.

"We'll figure it out."

When they kiss, slow and tentative in the dark of the deck, it feels feels more normal than anything else in Dean's life.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter Eight**

Castiel's alarm clock goes off at seven AM on the dot. Dean groans. "Can it _not_ be Monday? I could use another day to process, you know?"

He can hear Castiel moving about, and the alarm clock stops. Dean rolls over to watch Castiel rub sleep from his eyes. As easy as it would have been to pull Castiel into bed, to ride the high of emotion, cooler heads had prevailed. Somehow.

"I could use the order of the library right now." Castiel pulls some clean clothes from the closet, yawning all the while. "When life is a nightmare, at least the books still make sense."

"You sound like Sam." From inside, a particularly well-aimed kick forces Dean to shift. This early in the morning, the baby is still awake. Sam had explained it once, something about the motion of the day rocking the baby to sleep, but it just sounded like voodoo to Dean. "Hey, come here."

"I have to get ready for work."

"You can be two minutes late. It's a baby thing." Dean sits up and moves his warm quilt; he immediately regrets it, because holy shit, it's cold. When Castiel is just close enough, Dean grabs his hand and presses it flat against the right side of his stomach.

The baby shifts.

Castiel's face goes oddly blank. "Oh." He presses his hand a bit closer, but the baby apparently doesn't like to perform on cue. "That's - It's really alive in there."

"Yeah."

Clearing his throat, Castiel straightens upright. "I have to go to work. There's a lot to do. Tonight, we - we can talk. Perhaps without fighting."

"No promises," Dean says as Castiel leaves the room. He tries to go back to sleep, exhausted with the late night and the growing baby - how was it no one ever mentioned how _tiring_ it was to be pregnant? But all he does is listen to the shower run, the microwave beep, and eventually the front door creak and close.

Eventually, he gives up and dresses for the day. Sure, he's getting tired of sweats, but at least everything is warm.

The shoebox is still sitting on the kitchen counter, untouched from the night before. (_You don't know that_, some part of the back of his mind says; _how many times did you tell Sam you were done drinking?_) Dean finds himself opening it again, rattling pill bottles and examining the contents of each carefully. How realistically could Cas detox from this, how often had he been been using to stay level?

"Hey, is there a spare Xanax in there?" Luke asks as he walks through in boxes and a t-shirt. "I've got a test in, like, two hours and I am not ready."

Dean holds up the bottle and finds it sparse. "You sure about that?"

Luke snatches the bottle. "Trust me - I know chemicals. Tell Cas I'll get him back later."

"Don't, actually."

This gets him a curious look from Luke, eyebrows raised. "Do we disapprove, Drill Sergeant Winchester?"

He can't blame Luke for this - much as he wishes it could be that easy. How much nicer to think that it was just the influence of some twenty-something stoner, and not something just built into Castiel-the-Human. "Do what you want, but Cas can't - I know how far he'll fall, if he doesn't quit."

Luke nods, his lips pursed, and he looks into the box from the other side of the counter. "I can respect a well-intentioned intervention." He pokes through the contents carefully. He removes the bag of pot, the papers and the pipe, sets them aside, and carries the box off to his room. A moment later he returns with a wad of mismatched bills. "There, saves you and me both time. Pass it on."

Dean sets it all on the counter and mentally marks it as _Castiel's Problem._

* * *

When Castiel returns from work, he looks like hell; he sets two canvas bags full of groceries on the table and heads out to the deck, pounding a fresh pack of cigarettes against his palm before he even sits down. The evening is already dark and overcast, and Dean slides out behind him, sliding the door closed.

"Cold turkey isn't the best way," he says as Castiel takes that first long drag off his cigarette. "I'm guessing you tried that today."

"I used to have _will_ over my ves - my _body_." Cas twitches where he sits, taps his foot and exhales. "I always told myself that stopping was simply a matter of will." He flicks the ash of his cigarette onto the ground in three sharp movements, like he would rather just punch the ash out of existence. "I'm angry, Dean."

Dean keeps his distance. "I know. You should've seen me each time I promised Sam I'd quit drinking, while you were gone. I'd make it three days, and then learn how to drink stealthier. It sucks when you can function and still make bad choices."

"Why did you stop?"

Dean laughs. "You knocked me up. And trust me, I still wanted to - want to, even. But then again, it's been so long that I sort of just like being even. Sober is nice. Boring, sometimes, but it usually hurts less."

It doesn't look like Castiel takes much solace from the news, finishing his cigarette in record speeds and lighting another until his twitching eases. Dean steps inside to grab the cash and what was left of Castiel's stash. He sets it carefully on the table.

"Luke bought you out, mostly."

Castiel's eyes wander the small pile, and there's so much want in his eyes. "And this, you're okay with?"

Dean shrugs and leans back in his chair. "Sure. I'm not you're dad, Cas. I just don't want to see you break."

Castiel snorts, but he shoves the money in his pocket and sets in on his pipe. "I've been worse," he says. "Before this job and before I heard from you, it was - I was going much more aggressively numb."

They sit quietly for a while, Dean watching while Castiel works himself down into a calm bit by bit. It must work, because eventually he sits still. "I ended my relationship with Daphne today."

Dean winces. He knew it had to come, logically, but hearing it still hurt. For as much as he wanted Castiel to himself (and he did, oh, he was tired of sharing) he hated to think of her as caught in the crossfire. "How did it go?"

"She was hurt. I answered her questions without revealing your secrets."

This makes Dean sit up and take notice through the haze of guilt. "You didn't tell her about - us." The word falls like a weight, strange and awkward when they hadn't even defined exactly what _us_ is supposed to be.

"I didn't think it my place."

They fall silent again. It's strange, how comfortable they've become over the years, how intimately they know each other, and yet how they're both avoiding the inevitable. Thick clouds obscure moon rise. The breeze is heavy and humid.

"I love you, you know." There, done. Dean can feel the flush in his cheeks, but it's been said.

"I know." Castiel even sounds amused. "Probably longer than you have. That doesn't mean you'll stay. You loved Lisa too."

_Ouch._ "You think I'm going to leave?"

"It is your method. You were going to leave our child, and I'm fairly sure you love it."

Dean's first instinct is to get mad, to argue that he had perfectly good reasons for choosing to do so - but instead he swallows that and takes a moment to gather his thoughts. "I was. I do. It seemed like the least complicated way to give it an uncomplicated life."

"Perhaps it is - but I want complicated, if it means I have the two of you."

Dean clears his throat. "Yeah. Me too."

"You can't leave when it gets hard."

"It's looking to get hard her pretty fucking soon. How are we even supposed to get this thing out of me? I mean, I can't just go into labor. Can I?" The idea sets his teeth on edge, and he shudders.

"I have no idea," Castiel says. He laughs and leans close to Dean, patting his hand. "We have time. Three months, yes?"

"Yeah."

"We'll come up with a solution before then," Castiel says. "I promise. I can figure something out."

* * *

They bask for a couple days in a post _I love you_ world, where fond glances are exchanged, soft words are spoken, and even Luke gets sick of it. They laugh when he storms out of the room ranting, "I fucking called this Brokeback thing!"

When the happy daze clears, Dean finds himself preoccupied with the thought of Daphne - more than he thinks about the baby and his impending labor, more than he thinks about his uncertain future with Castiel.

On Friday, he's finally had enough; he hops the bus onto campus with Luke. No one at the bus stop seems to have anything to say, instead hunching down to avoid the cold drizzle of rain that swings in on the wind.

Thankfully, the bus is less packed. They find seats, much to the relief of Dean's lower back; last week he though he was dying, and instead of sympathy, Sam e-mailed him information about sciatica. "Do you know were Daphne works?" he asks, hoping he sounds casual and not sort of terrified.

Luke whistles under his breath. "Going out for a jilted lover visit? Seems risky, Winchester."

"Its just a regular visit," Dean snaps. "Do you know or not?"

"Yeah, gimme a second, I'll write it down." Luke digs a piece of paper out of his bag and writes out the instructions, including Daphne's office number. "She's in the basement, but she got a sweet office in the deal. I crashed there once."

"Did she know?"

"You hurt me, Winchester." Luke grins. He stuffs his backpack back together and wrenches the zipper to shut it. "Good luck." They come to their stop, and Dean follows the instructions on the paper. The crowd on campus is thinner, and everyone is bundled in heavy coats and hats and gloves. Still, the people who speak sound exuberant and excited. Winter break is just around the corner, after all.

The building is full of chattering students lined up in the halls; the architecture and general wear reveals it as an old building, and the draft that whistles through the closed doors confirms it. The steps are wet with the rain, and Dean holds tight to the rail as he heads down to the basement.

It's quieter down here, the rooms clearly reserved for offices. He walks near to the end of the hall before he finds the room marked Dr. Allen. The door is cracked, and light shines through. Steeling his breath, Dean knocks.

"Come in!" As usual, she sounds cheerful - but the look on her face settles into a sort of forced calm when Dean opens her door. "Dean. I wasn't expecting you."

"I know. I, um, didn't expect to come?" How did people in the real world handle this sort of thing? If it were Sammy he had done wrong, he would have just barreled through it with insults and yelling until they hit the other end, relieved from the effort. He had a feeling that it wouldn't be that easy with Daphne. "I wanted to apologize."

"It's not your fault," she says, matter of fact. "Relationships end, after all. I should have expected that with someone like Cas, it was bound not to last."

"No, you shouldn't have - its impossible to go into every relationship expecting it to end and - may I sit down? My back is killing me."

She looks him up and down, then sighs. "Yes, please do."

Dean stops himself from groaning with relief and he lowers himself into the chair on the other side of her desk. He tries to find his train of thought. "I spent a long time jumping into relationships with the certainty that it would end bloody. Its awful. It makes it hard to trust that anything is quite right." He swallows and adds, "And it is my fault. I understand that Cas didn't say anything."

"Oh." She leans forward on the desk with one arm, the other hand covering her mouth. After a moment she clears her throat and nods. "I see. I suppose, in retrospect, that's a bit obvious, isn't it?"

"Is it?"

She smiles, though its more sad than Dean would like. "Him fawning over you, your protective gruffness - yes, it is." Leaning back in her seat, she gives him a more appraising look. "When you came back here, did you two intend to..." She flushes, just a little.

"No. Well." It's Dean's turn to flush, but he forces himself not to look away. Face it like a hunt - head on and without embarrassment. "I sort of hoped, but he didn't - not that I knew he had a girlfriend at the time."

"That makes sense." Daphne exhales and sits up straighter in seat. "I appreciate this show of guilt, or confession; trust me, I understand exactly what the urge for absolution looks like. You want me to hold you blameless. That it must have been meant to be."

"I - "

She holds up a hand. "Maybe it was. I do believe in destiny, you know. But you come in here days after the man I love dumped me. I appreciate you clearing up the details, but you can't expect my forgiveness yet. I'm going to hurt for a while. It wasn't fair to me, that no one explained what was really happening here." She closes her eyes and takes a breath, then lets it out slowly. "But I'm going to be fine. I do wish you the best, Dean. Both of you."

Dean can hear the implicit _Get out_ underneath it, and nods. "Thank you. I'm sorry." He pushes himself upright and rolls his shoulders, desperate to say something else. He wants to talk until she understands, but he can't tell her the whole truth. And if he can't do that, there's nothing else he can say.

* * *

Instead of heading straight back to the apartment, Dean takes the bus out to WalMart and lets himself wander the baby section. It's not something he's done since he and Sam went to the terrifying baby store.

Swallowing his anxiety, Dean forces himself into the one of the practical aisles. Bottles. He picks up about four different kinds and starts reading, his eyes glazing over between labels declaring _No BPA!_ and _Best imitates the breast!_ He decides on a set of small glass bottles, liking the heft of them and the lack of color. (_You could use it a a weapon_, he thinks, and then wonders who's going to attack while he's feeding his baby.)

He's standing in front of baby proofing supplies, wondering if he really needs a lock on the toilet, when he sees it. The home fetal doppler. At first he sort of laughs at the idea of paranoid pregnant women frantically checking for their baby's heartbeat, and then he thinks of Castiel.

He adds it to the basket with a tub of generic formula and a pack of double a batteries, and rushes to the checkout like someone might catch him and asks questions. The cashier is an older woman, and she just smiles as she rings him up.

The bus home feels too slow, and he's agonized to find that there's still hours before Castiel comes home from work. He tears apart the packaging of the doppler, trying to catalog the pieces and the little packets of gel (_lube_, his brain supplies, but he ignores it) and the instructions. He even debates trying it alone first, but rejects it. This is something neither of them have experienced, and he wants to do it together.

Instead, he showers. He tries to nap. He snacks on half a pizza. He plays video games. He nearly jumps out of his skin when the front door opens and Castiel comes through with a bag of take out. "You're late!"

Castiel holds the bag up. "I figured you were hungry."

He is, actually - he's ravenous despite the half-a-pizza, but he wants to do this and he wants to do it _now_. Especially while Luke is gone. "We need to go to the bedroom. Right now."

"Our dinner will get cold."

"It's gonna be worth it, I promise." Dean lumbers out of his seat and leads the way, and Castiel follows with a small laugh. It's not until they're in the bedroom and the door is closed that he realizes what it sounds like. He flushes, aroused just to realize that Castiel followed him in for _sex_, and hastens to add, "It's not sex."

Pausing with his hand on his belt buckle, Castiel clears his throat. Not so casually he slides his hands into his pockets. "Okay. What's so important?"

"This." Dean sits on the bed and shows the doppler to Castiel. With a slight tremble in his hands, he holds out the instructions. "You wanted to be able to connect to the baby. And every pregnant woman in the country does this at least once, right? We ought to at least get to listen in or something."

Castiel's expression has gone soft, and he licks his lips as he reads the instructions. Dean resists the urge to rush him, and instead lifts his sweatshirt. How strange it is, to look down at his stomach, all round and tight and unfamiliar, and not hate it for once. For a second it tightens, his own midsection gripped in an ache that takes his breath away - but it passes in a second, before Dean thinks to mention it.

Finally, Castiel tears open a gel packet, and Dean settles back while he turns on the machine and slides the handle over Dean's stomach.

It takes a second, then the machine picks up something - an echoing, rapid noise, less like a heartbeat and more like the background to some shitty techno song. At first Dean struggles with it, and then he hears the rhythm in it, the the steady _wub-wub-wub_ of his kid's heartbeat.

Castiel's face is nearly as amazing as the heartbeat itself, his free hand over his mouth while he intently follows the baby with the little wand. It's a full minute, maybe two, before he speaks. "That's amazing."

"Yeah."

Hesitantly, Castiel pulls the wand back and turns off the machine. He sets it aside, and Dean cleans his stomach with the blanket before pulling his sweatshirt down. Castiel stares at the lump underneath, and says in a rushed voice, "I'd like to name a son James. If we have a son."

Dean blinks. He hasn't thought about it. He'd first spent so much time expecting the baby to die, then expecting to give it away if it lived, that baby names never came up. "Okay," he says. "After - "

"Of course. It seems... right. I like it. I always did." Castiel looks down at his hands, and adds, "I didn't think about names for a daughter. Do you have any family names?"

"I don't want to share them," Dean says. "Pretty much everyone in my family has met a gruesome end, and I don't want that legacy to follow our kid."

"Oh. Is James too - "

"Not if you want it, it's not." Dean tries to think of a name that isn't associated with some woman that died horribly in his life - and finds that he's woefully short on that list. Instead he begins to reach for names he likes, and finds that he doesn't know of any that aren't also women he's slept with. There has to be a better legacy out there somewhere, if they have a daughter. "We'll come back to girl's names. Maybe we'll get one of those books."

Castiel smiles; his whole face seems brighter with it, and he continues to glance at Dean's stomach. Which chooses that exact moment to growl. "Dinner. While its still warm." He stands, and helps Dean up off the bed. For an awkward moment they stand together, then Castiel pulls him into a hug. "Thank you."

Once they've gotten their take out containers shared between them and sat at the table, Dean grins and says, "You thought we were having sex."

Castiel chokes on his dinner, covering his mouth as he sputters. Once he's cleared his throat, he says, "It's not as though..." He shakes his head, a small smile on his face. "Yes. It sounded ambiguous."

"You totally wanted it."

"You're right - that hasn't changed about me."

Now Dean stares down at his dinner. Sure, he's hungry, but... He clears his throat. "So, you know. We can - "

Castiel stands fast enough that his plate clatters. "We have a microwave."

Dean laughs as he follows Castiel to the bedroom.


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter Nine**

Dean wakes to a sharp twinge in his left side. He waits, but it doesn't happen again. Apparently his rent-a-uterus is practicing for labor despite the futility of it. The longer he has one of these things, the more convinced he is that the whole birth process is insane. It just happens, whether he wants it to or not.

Castiel snorts in his sleep and nestles closer to Dean's back.

Dean sighs and shifts, trying to get comfortable. The baby has definitely grown in the last three weeks, and he's getting more uncomfortable with every little spurt. He's got _stretch marks_, what the fuck. He brushes his fingers over the little grooves on the definitive slope of his abdomen. It's not quite the Hollywood Belly of his nightmares, but he's certain that left unchecked, it's going get there. Before long, he's going to have to hide in the bedroom and only come out when Luke is in class.

He rolls to his other side and pulls the blankets further up over his head.

"You're awful to share a bed with," Castiel grumbles, rolling out of the bed and taking the blanket with him. Dean tries to kick him he goes, but misses. "I'll start breakfast in ten minutes."

Dean blows him a raspberry as he leaves the room. Well, no use laying in bed without the blanket. He stretches and makes his way into the other room. Castiel is on the deck, smoking a cigarette with the comforter wrapped around him. Dean pops the door open long enough to say, "A jacket would be more practical," before closing the cold out.

While Castiel finishes his cigarette, Dean pours them bowls of cereal. "I was going to cook," Castiel says, piling the comforter on the couch.

"No worries," Dean says, pouring milk and passing Castiel a bowl. They sit down to enjoy breakfast, and he could do this for the rest of his life. The past couple of weeks have been all talk and getting to know each other in the aftermath of the Apocalypse – years later than they should have.

And on the other side, it's apparently domesticity and relaxation. And another weird ache in his gut. Dean tries rubbing it out like a knot in a tricky muscle, and it passes.

The weekly text message arrives right on schedule - so perfectly that Dean is convinced that Sam actually scheduled them in advance. _Welcome to Week 31: you're officially in the single digits._

"Check that out." Dean tosses the phone overhand to Castiel. "We may need to start making plans for this thing after all." Grinning down into his cereal, Dean takes a big bite and tries to come to terms with the idea that this thing could happen in just over two months.

Castiel hums as he glances at the text message. "Sam certainly remains optimistic." He slides the phone back to Dean. "I admit, I haven't prepared for the possibility that the baby would hold to term."

"Of course it'll hold to term. Winchesters are too stubborn to die in the face of impossible odds."

Castiel snorts through a laugh and ducks his head to hide a smile. "That's certainly true."

For the first time in a long time, Dean begins to look at the future with a little bit of cheer. They were on the same side, finally. (Though he hadn't said anything to Sam about it. No use in getting ahead of himself.)

Another twinge hits Dean while he's in the shower, harder and longer than the first one this morning. "Quit it," he grumbles, as though he need only will his body into submission. "You couldn't squeeze that thing out if you tried." He finishes his shower and dresses in something warm. He might go steal that comforter back and have a lazy day. A lazy day sounds marvelous.

"So, how do we explain to Luke that you've suddenly inherited a newborn?" Dean asks as Castiel heads out to the deck for one more cigarette before work. He might have been coming down alright from the self-medicating, but the smoking was getting worse.

"I hadn't intended to explain it."

"He's not stupid, he's likely to notice." But the deck door slides closed, and Dean shakes his head. He turns to collect the comforter when his whole midsection spasms in pain, so hard and fast that curls instinctively around the pain. His knees hit the ground and he pukes, heaving blood and bile on the carpet. His vision flashes when the baby thrashes.

He can't speak, choking and rolling to his side. There's another spasm. His guts ripped out, his body turning inside out. He's definitely dying; he knows the feeling. When he holds a hand to his midsection, he can feel the rippling of the baby beneath his skin, the softness lent by the uterus gone.

He's not dying alone. He squeezes his eyes shut and tries to shout for help, but there's no air in his lungs. He heaves.

"Dean - Dean! Can you walk?"

_Oh thank god_, Dean thinks. He shakes his head, struggling to bring in enough air. Everything inside him is crushed. He finds himself slipping in and out of coherence as Castiel touches his abdomen and his face and his lower back.

Castiel shouts.

Dean blinks. People in uniforms shove him in to an ambulance. One man presses on Dean's gut, and Dean vomits blood again, bright red and frothy all over his hands.

"What the fuck is that? Angela, feel this!" the man says, his voice urgent and his hands too hard. Dean wants to tell them not to crush his baby, but he isn't even sure which words to use.

Castiel grips his hand, so tight that when Dean finds that his mind begins to go blank he can still feel it. He hears Castiel mumbling in what sounds like an old language.

Dean tries to smile and say something reassuring. Instead he convulses. People holding him down on the stretcher until it passes.

The kicking in his gut slows - he reaches for his baby, trapped under his skin, but someone bats his hand away. He's unloaded at breakneck speed while someone yells, the words fuzzy and out of focus. It all seems so stereotypical of a hospital drama that Dean actually laughs.

The baby stops moving.

"Cas." His voice is weak in his own ears, but at least he has one again. He can't actually see Castiel over the bright lights flashing overhead, but he can still feel him. "I don't think this is going to work."

"I will make it work!"

Castiel's hand slips away, and the bright hospital is replaced with a dimmer room. When Dean's head lolls to the side, he sees someone placing an IV while someone else pressing something hard and painful to his stomach.

"No fucking way."

Dean can't even blame the guy - he can hear himself in the guy's disbelief and surprise. Dean exhales, "Yes fucking way," before he finally doesn't hurt at all.

* * *

This is a dream.

Dean can tell by now when something unwelcome messes around in his head. Instead of a frantic operating room, Dean sits cross-legged on the ground like a child, a plain white blanket on the grass in front of him. In the space of blink he's no longer alone.

The man sitting at the opposite side of the blanket has all the classic markers of an angel: he's intruding in Dean's dreams and he's wearing a suit even though he otherwise has the skinny, flop-haired look of a college student. The angel has a baby, small and grey and quiet, tucked into the crook of his arm.

An angel is visiting his dreams, holding what is most certainly his child. Dean's stomach drops.

The angel smiles. "Hello, Dean. My name is Inias. I've heard so much about you."

Dean swallows, and it's like trying to bring down a grapefruit. He isn't sure if he should snatch the kid away from Inias' grasp or sit patiently and hope the angel doesn't disappear. He can't seem to speak.

"Small humans are so fragile," Inias says. There's an airy, gentle quality to his voice, and when he smiles at Dean again, he shows his teeth like he's genuinely happy. "Our Father has always told us that life is a miracle, but I have never seen an infant so close. Your humanity is charming."

"Please - "

"My brother called for me." Inias lays the baby out the blanket.

Dean knows then that Castiel was right. It was always impossible. He wants to reach out, to hold the baby for as long as he can before the angel takes it away.

Inias brushes a thumb over the baby's small chest. The skin colors to a soft pink flush. Dean's heart skips a beat.

"Before Castiel left the garrison he told stories of you. Bringing you to life was the greatest honor our Father bestowed upon him."

Inias holds the baby's hands, then feet. Dean watches the little joints spasm in reflex.

"Angels do not have children, not the way humans do, so you will have to forgive him if he has trouble. It was hard for him when suddenly he had a heart and it walked the earth with Dean Winchester. Loving a child will be torture, at first - but he will learn."

Inias leans over and kisses the child's forehead. Bright eyes snap open. Dean makes a small choked sound between a sob and a laugh.

_This is just a dream_, he reminds himself. The baby tilts its head, and he wonders if its a boy or a girl. _Don't get attached to your dream._

"I would not hurt you like this." Inias coos at the child, making a small _boop_ noise as he touches the tip of the baby's nose. "This child is a gift, Dean. Remember that." Then he inhales deep, for so long that a breeze brushes past Dean's arms, giving him goosebumps.

Inias exhales a long and slow breath on the baby's face.

The baby wails.

* * *

Everything hurts.

When he got hurt as a kid, his dad would clap him on the shoulder and say, _"Pain makes you tough, kiddo; pain means you're still kickin'."_

Dean lays there, afraid that if he moves he's going to disrupt something important and stitched up. He listens to his breath, in and out, and reminds himself that at least he's still kicking.

"Thank you," Castiel says, and Dean almost responds before he's beaten to the punch.

"I would have helped sooner, if I had known."

Inias. Somewhere, his kid might be alive.

Dean opens one eye to see Castiel and Inias standing the foot of his bed. Inias has a hand on Castiel's shoulder.

Castiel looks strung out and worn down. "I wasn't sure our Father would permit interference. That perhaps losing them was part of my punishment."

Dean closes his eyes, not ready to be confronted with reality quite yet. He holds on to the image of that baby in his dreams, just in case he never sees it again.

"Our Father may be unfathomable, but He is not cruel. He certainly would not wish that pain on you. After all, He is the one who sent you on Dean Winchester's path."

"Zachariah did that."

"Perhaps Zachariah thought it was his will alone."

Soft hands touch his abdomen, and Dean's eyes snap open to find Inias lifting his hospital gown. Dean glances down to look at the bruised and sliced wreck of his body. The stretch marks and the loose flesh. It sucks the air out of him to look at, the physical reminder of what he's endured.

"Humans try so hard, but they cannot mend it all." Inias places a hand flat on Dean's gut, and the pain abates. Dean's insides feel less like something thrown in a blender. The surgical scar fades.

"Thank you," Dean says, his voice hoarse as he runs a hand over his (_his_, completely and utterly _his_) abdomen. Castiel hovers on his other side, and hands over a small plastic cup filled with lukewarm water. "Did you really - "

"Yes," Inias says. "I am not quite done yet; if you'll excuse me." He's gone without any fanfare, just that soft flutter of wings. Dean scoots a little to the left, giving Castiel enough room to sit on the bed.

"Cliff notes?" Dean asks.

Castiel tilts his head just so. "I don't understand."

Dean chuckles. There's still a deep ache, like something large punched him hard and left all the bruises on the inside. "What happened?"

Castiel looks toward the door. "Internal damage. A lot of it - before Inias..." He holds Dean's hand like he's trying to moor himself to a boat in a storm. "You were as good as dead. According to the doctors, the baby was dead - except then he wasn't."

"He?" Dean grins despite the pain and despite the panic making his heart race, because _he has a son_. "How is he doing?"

"Strong, considering he was dead," Castiel replies. "I suppose every Winchester needs at least one practice death." He clears his throat, and Dean doesn't miss that his hands shake. "He requires constant care - but he is breathing, and the nurses tell me he has an appetite. He is expected to be very healthy with time."

"Have you seen him?"

"He's lovely."

"Good."

"Do you want to?"

Dean shakes his head, dizzy at the thought. "No, not yet. I should heal and stuff, before I try to handle him." Castiel looks disappointed, and Dean squeezes his hand. "You go. Did you call Sam?"

"Not yet."

"If you don't mind me borrowing your phone, I can do it. Go on, go visit our son." The word _son_ blossoms an unfamiliar panic within him, overshadowing that excitement from before; he shoves it down under all the other feelings he refuses to acknowledge. It's just because he hasn't seen him. He'll feel better when he knows.

Castiel kisses him, careful and chaste, before he passes over his phone and leaves with the promise to return before long. Dean tilts his head back and lays his hands over his abs, reveling that once again his body is good and right.

Sam doesn't answer his cell, so Dean tries the fake FBI line. Sam picks up in two rings. "Agent Delaney speaking."

"Hey, Agent Delaney, you too cool to answer your brother's calls?"

"Dean! This is a business line. I left my cell at my - at a friend's. Call me on the regular line."

Dean shakes his head and laughs, just a shallow little thing to avoid jostling his bruised gut. He makes Sam wait for a couple minutes before he calls the regular salvage line.

Sam is clearly eating something when he answers. "So, what's new?"

"Well, Uncle Sam, you have a nephew."

Sam chokes and coughs for a second, following by a long pause. "You mean, living and breathing nephew?"

"On the outside and everything."

"Is he okay?"

"Yeah, yeah, Cas says he's fine. But I'm currently locked in a hospital bed with a freshly healed gut here, so - "

"I'll be out there in no time. Congrats!" Sam hangs up, and Dean sets the phone aside. He leans back into the pillow and closes his eyes, trying to remember the baby from his dream. Like the good dreams always do, it slips away like smoke in the wind.

He goes back to sleep; it seems well-deserved.

* * *

"Get this," Dean says when Sam visits the hospital the next day. "I am ready to be discharged after the nastiest case of appendicitis that my nurse has ever seen. I've apparently been in recovery for weeks. The paperwork is all legit." He digs into his vanilla pudding and grins. "How was the flight?"

"Not fast enough." Sam pulls up and a chair to sit by Dean's bed. "How are you?"

"I just said _ready to be discharged_. Cas called an angel buddy in to handle all the messy stuff. I'm gonna miss having an angel on retainer."

Sam winces, not that Dean blames him. Their dealings with angels outside of Castiel have never been very good news. "And it went okay? They didn't try to - I don't know, do anything?"

"Not this time." Dean scoops out the last of his pudding and sighs happily. Shitty hospital food is so much like road food that it's almost like being home. Now that he's rested and on the mend, he feels like he might burst out of his skin. "Cas just brought my clothes, actually. The poor bastard had no idea what to look for in a car seat, though, so I don't suppose you..."

"Of course I did, Dean." Sam smiles and punches him in the side affectionately, which makes Dean swear - but it's great. It's fantastic. "Tell me everything. How's your son? What's he look like? What's his name?"

Dean balks but tries not to show it. The more he thinks about it, the more he can't imagine trying to hold his son. "You didn't stop by the NICU? I figured you would have been there first."

"I wanted to make sure you were okay first."

They share one of those looks where they try to get all the emotional stuff done through eye contact alone. Dean hopes Sam understands that he's trying to say, _I love you, and thank you for caring enough for both of us._ Because there's only so much Dean can bring himself to say.

Sam clears his throat and looks away first. "I checked in with Cas on the phone earlier, though. He said the doctors are all really optimistic that you'll be able to bring him home within a couple weeks."

"Wait, what?" Dean sits up too fast and winces when his stomach burns. "A few _weeks_?"

"I looked it up," Sam says. "It's normal. He has still has growing to do." They're quiet for a moment, and then Sam starts to grin. It's huge and makes him look like a little kid. "So, you had a baby."

"Shut up."

Sam snickers and stretches his legs out, leaning uncharacteristically low on the chair. "So, do you know if you're bringing him home or staying here with Cas?"

"We haven't decided yet." Dean's stomach twists at the thought. "I'd rather come back to the yard, but if Cas wants to keep working here, we'll work something out."

"We, huh?"

"Is it weird? Because I always sort of figured that we'd get old and crotchety together like Bobby."

"I never intended to grow old with you - _I'm_ not your boyfriend." Sam grunts as he stretches, then stands. "Come on, if you're ready to be discharged, get dressed and come show me your son."

Not wanting to let on that he hasn't even gone down to meet the kid yet, Dean says, "Go on, let me dress in peace. I'll be right behind you."

Sam leaves, shutting the door behind him.

Dean stands and twists all around to test his muscles. Everything is holding up. He examines himself naked, examining every inch of a body he'd missed almost as much as he missed alcohol. How many years have people been messing with his body, of changing things around and remaking him into something new?

Everything is his. Every inch of this body belongs to him. The stretch marks and scar that would have marked where a child nestled within him are gone, and there's no residual girl parts on his insides or outsides.

Dean realizes for the first time in a long time, he's alone. He breathes deep and suddenly really, _really_ wants a drink. It's been too long since he's been in control.

He dresses. He shoves his wallet in his back pocket and stretches again, reveling even in the things that hurt because they're _his_.

When he leaves, he stops by the nurse's station. "Excuse me, can you direct me toward the NICU?"

The nurse smiles at him, and puts on a serious affectation. "Mr. Winchester, fiyou're not officially discharged yet. I can't just let you wander around."

"Oh, Betty, don't break my heart." Dean leans on the counter and fixes her with his best grin. "My buddy just had a baby, and I'm dying to meet the kid."

"Oh, I know all about Mr. Novak's baby. He's an adorable new father, don't you think?"

Dean thinks back to Castiel, sharing the narrow space of the hospital bed and describing the baby as he drifted off to sleep. Dean smiles and swallows a lump in his throat. "Yeah. he is."

"Alright, well, if you promise to come right back for the paperwork. Take the elevator down to the second floor. It's going to be right there, you can't miss it. Right back, Mr. Winchester."

"Scouts honor," Dean says as he walks to the elevator. He feels healthy. He's wearing his own clothes, no rubber bands required, and he's up on two feet and the world is right. He bounces a bit on his heels as the elevator dings down twice.

When the doors open, he sees Castiel and Sam. They're behind the glass of a nursery, their backs to him, with a nurse standing nearby. Sam looms over an incubator. He's smiling.

Down that hall is his baby, the only reminder left of anything that happened in the last year. Dean closes his eyes. _Go meet your son._ His heart races, and he can't catch his breath. He's reminded of blood on the floor and hands pressing all over him and dying again.

The doors slide closed with a ding. Dean exhales. He presses the button for the ground floor, his hands shaking. It won't take long at all - it's early in the afternoon and he gets lucky enough to hail a cab. There's still cash in his wallet, and Luke isn't home when he gets to the apartment.

_You promised you wouldn't run_, Dean tells himself as he unwinds Cas' apartment key from his keyring. He throws his belongings in a bag.

The carpet is still stained with his blood.

He can't do this, he had always known he'd be a shitty father. Castiel can manage without him; he can smooth things over with Daphne. Sam will be there to help.

He throws his duffel over his shoulder and locks the door behind him.

There's still baby stuff in the trunk of the Impala. Dean's phone rings the first time as he leaves it all in the lobby.

The phone rings again five minutes later, as he's pulling a couple hundred dollars out of an ATM. It hardly dents the account, another mercy. Sam won't be left destitute because of him.

Dean receives a text message as he's taking the ramp onto the highway, but he doesn't check his phone until Seattle is 150 miles in his rear view. By then his phone is packed with text messages, voice messages, and missed calls.

_I'm sorry._

He turns off his phone and keeps driving.


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter Ten**

Dean drives as much as possible, and sleeps in the Impala at rest stops. He keeps waiting for some sign that he recently carried a baby in his body. But the marks are gone and the baby is gone and there's just Dean, speeding down the highway at 90 miles per hour waiting for some sort of revelation.

He turns his phone off during the day, and doesn't turn it back on until he's ready to go to sleep at night. He's up to seven voice mails, but he can't listen past the first few seconds.

_Hey, are you lost? The nurse said you left for -_

_Dean, where are you?_

_This isn't funny -_

_Your stuff is gone - where's the car?_

_Dean, I need to know if this is -_

_You have a son! You can't -_

_Call me, Dean. Please don't -_

The text messages aren't any different, except one that includes a photo. He sees the little icon telling him there's a picture, and he knows that it's going to be of his son. He can't look at the baby.

He doesn't even know why he's running, but whenever he thinks about turning around and going back to see Castiel and the baby, his stomach knots and his heart hurts and he can't breathe.

He goes to Vegas. It's late in the evening when he arrives. Once again, he checks in under the name _Morrison_. While he pays for the room, he asks, "Hey, is Gemma in?"

The girl smiles up at him from the computer. "You nearly missed her; I think she's in the bar."

Taking his key card, he winks. "Thanks." He stuffs the card into his pocket and walks over. He expects to find her tending bar, but instead she's sitting nursing a martini. The bar isn't busy, so he slides into the seat next to her. "Hi."

"Oh, seriously? I thought we have an agreement. You know - never again?"

He clears his throat. "This isn't a business call. I never said thank you. You know, for fixing it."

"Your brother did." She downs the rest of her martini and motions to the bartender, who starts making another. "What do you want, Morrison?"

"I was pregnant."

She leans one elbow on the bar and gapes at him. "Are you fucking serious?"

"One hundred percent."

"I apparently did too good a job. Just another reason I choose _not_ to use what I've got, I might add." The bartender drops off her martini; she orders Dean a scotch. "So, you were..." Her amusement abates. "I didn't do that."

"I know - I'm well aware who did."

She snorts through a laugh, which grows into a muted series of giggles that make Dean smile. Okay, it's funny. Objectively, it's sort of hilarious. "Look, I'm _sorry_. I am. What happened?"

The scotch arrives, and Dean sips it slowly. After going dry for so long, it's bitter on his tongue. "I have a... Oh, fuck it, his father was able to put a uterus in there. Temporarily." It hurts to say aloud, when he's reminded that the whole thing was temporary and the whole thing failed painfully. If Inias hadn't answered Castiel's call, if the ambulance had taken too long - one or both of them could be dead.

"That's... It was the scruffy dude, wasn't it? I thought I got a weird vibe off him." She sips her martini. "I'm sorry it didn't work out."

Dean orders another scotch. "Oh, it worked out. He's in a NICU in Seattle right now. I was pregnant for almost... eight months."

The bartender scoffs as he sets the scotch on the b ar. "You mean your girlfriend, man; don't be one of those guys."

"Sure," Dean says. The bartender shrugs and walks away. Gemma stares at him while idly circling the rim of her drink with one finger. "What?"

"You have a premature baby in Seattle."

"Yes."

"That's... Wow. I thought I had problems. What the fuck are you doing here, Morrison?"

Another scotch down the hatch, and Dean shrugs. "I don't know. I was going to see my son, and instead I ran. Now I'm here."

"When you should be there."

He nods. "When I should be there."

* * *

After twelve hours of sleep in a real bed, Dean leaves Vegas.

He wants to stop by Cicero to check on Lisa and Ben - he always wants to see if Lisa and Ben are okay - but he doesn't want to risk it. She only remembers him as the man who hit her with his car.

Aimless, exhausted, and alone, Dean goes home. He hits Sioux Falls in the early morning. He has two new voice messages. Sam is beginning to sound more resigned, Castiel more angry.

_I told you this would happen -_

_This is beyond -_

Instead of going home, Dean pulls into She had been invaluable in helping them claim ownership of the yard, and a decent friend at that. He could use a friend who isn't going to throw this baby thing back at him.

She's standing at another officer's desk when he enters. They stare at each other for a minute, then she crosses the room. He grins and opens his mouth to say hello. Before he can get a word out, she slaps him. "What the hell, Jody?"

"Where have you been?" When he doesn't answer, she scoffs. "What, did you think your brother didn't call me the second you went missing? What are you _thinking_, Dean?"

"What do you know?" He looks around to the other officers in the room, each one acting like they're not watching the display.

Jody rolls her eyes and pulls him back to her office. She sits him forcibly at the spare chair and closes the door. "You're going to call your brother, right now. You have a son, you can't just run off like this."

"I have a _son_," he says, trying to convey all his misery and indecision in that one sentence. He wants his mother. More than at any other time in his life, he wants his mother to hold his hand and tell him that it's all going to be okay. Instead he has Jody Mills yelling at him about his magic baby. "I haven't even - I don't know - I - " His breath comes in short, hard gasps and he can't stop. He's exhausted and he's shaking and he can't even -

Jody leans down and hugs him. She squeezes him and rubs circles in his back. "It's going to be okay, calm down." Eventually he does; he gains control of his breathing.

When she lets him go, she sits at her desk and leans down to a low drawer. She tosses him a flask. "Drink. You'll feel calmer."

"I think I'll pass, thanks." He sets the flask on the desk. "Jody, what am I doing?"

"If I have to guess, I would say panicking. Why did you run, Dean?"

Dean stares down at his hands. He feels sheepish and young. He's older now than his father was when he was born. His father would be ashamed to see him run like this. "It's not like - there's nothing to connect me to him."

"What?"

"Look." Dean hikes up his clothing to reveal his stomach. It looks just like it did before he was a woman, before he was pregnant - like all that time and all that experience hasn't touched him at all.

"Thanks for the show, but I don't see - "

"I'm not - It's bullshit, okay?" He pushes his shirt down and hunches further down in his chair. "I'm not his mother, but I'm not really his father either. Nothing of _me_ contributed to him. The eggs sure as fuck weren't mine, and the uterus was always sort of imaginary. I don't even have the scar to say, 'Hey, look what I did.'"

Jody takes a long sip from the flask before standing and untucking her uniform shirt, pulling it up over her stomach. She has a short, puckered scar running lengthwise down her abdomen, gone pink and shiny with age. Stretch marks, equally faded, run diagonally toward her belly button; her stomach is soft, almost wrinkled from an ordeal long gone. When she speaks, her voice is gentle but flat, so devoid of emotion that Dean is certain she's burying it all. "Hey, look what I did."

She tucks her shirt in as she speaks. "Dean, I'm not going to pretend I know a lot about this, but _you_ didn't change. And even if she magicked your genes totally wrong, who cares? Are you going to sit here and tell me you'd love that kid any less?"

_Family doesn't end with blood, after all._ Dean pulls his phone from his pocket, navigating to his text messages. He still hasn't looked at the photo; he taps it and immediately sets it on the desk. "All I can think of when I think about him, is how awful it was. I don't want to hold my kid, and just remember how much it hurt."

"You will," she says. "You'll look at this little stranger who hurt you so carelessly, and you will learn to love him. One day it'll be a distant memory. An ache, a nightmare - but it'll be nothing compared to what you got for all that trouble."

"What if I just suck at parenting?"

"We all suck at it," she says with a short laugh. "The key is to surround yourself with enough people to get you through the hard times." She leans forward and picks up the phone. She smiles, wide and maybe just a little misty eyed. "He's lovely, Dean. And he's most certainly your son." She holds the phone out.

Dean shakes his head. "I want to see him in person. I just - I've really wanted to see him."

"Then what are you doing here?" She closes the photo for him and motions for him to leave. He sends off a single text message on his way out to the car.

_I'm on my way._

* * *

Dean takes a plane and hates every second it. He had weighed the options: a plane ride that would get him there in a matter of hours, or a two day car ride. No contest. At least he got a power nap on the ride, removing the worst part of taking an airplane and getting just a little bit of rest in.

He takes a cab from the airport to the hospital, telling himself all the way _I can do this_. He had marched into about a hundred different more terrifying situations than a NICU.

He sends Castiel another text message, because he doesn't trust his voice if he calls. _I'm down the street._

Castiel decks him as a greeting; Dean actually stumbles and hits the pavement, his shirt sleeves wet. That's definitely a split lip - _way to meet the parents, kid._ Castiel glares down at him, wearing that stupid overcoat like a kid might wear a security blanket. Dean chuckles, wiping his lip on his cuff. "You and Jody should meet. You'd like each other."

"Are you - " Castiel closes his eyes and clenches his fists a couple times. "Do you - " He shakes his head and turns his back to Dean. When he speaks, he sounds no more composed. "You promised."

"I didn't actually use the words, 'I promise'," Dean says, even though that's not really better and humor clearly isn't the right way to fix this. So he hugs Castiel - wraps his arms around Castiel's shoulders and pulls him close. The proximity allows him to speak softly, to avoid attracting any more attention than they already have. "I'm sorry, okay? I panicked."

"When?"

"I saw you and Sam in the nursery." Dean lets him go, and they retreat to a nearby bench. Side by side, their knees touch just a little bit. It's a small comfort. "Any chance you have a cigarette?"

Castiel shakes his head. "The residue is bad for the baby."

"Huh. This has been a rough week for you in more ways than one."

Castiel's expression hardens, and he leans with his elbows on his knees. "I'm not amused."

"I know." Dean takes a deep breath, and just says it. Like pulling off a bandage. He reaches for Castiel's hand, and is relieved when Castiel doesn't pull away. "He scares the shit out of me. I would rather face a whole nest of vampires. At least I know how to handle vampires."

Castiel grips Dean's hand tighter. Dean has a flash of panic, where he remembers the bleeding and the flashing overhead lights, but it passes. "Do you think I'm not scared? He's just - he's so small, and foreign to me. Angels don't have infants in the way humans do; I have no guide for this."

"I'm sorry."

"You've said that. And I'll forgive you, soon enough. Because human love ignores all logic."

Dean can accept that; _soon enough_ is more hopeful than _never_ and certainly more than he deserves. "What's he like now?"

"Stronger. And..." Castiel tilts his head up to look at the stars. "Everyone says that he looks just like me. I don't see it. I hope he looks like you, because he can never resemble me. Perhaps this body is mine, but it does not reflect me."

"You never - "

"It does not change that I love him. Completely, and utterly, because we made him. You and I made a person, Dean. A brand new person who exists only because of us."

When he says it like that, Dean can almost forget how horrible it was to get to get the kid here in the first place. He takes a steadying breath. "You're right. Can I go meet our son now?"

They walk side-by-side, and stand close in the elevator, close enough that Dean wraps an arm around Castiel's waist and pulls him into a half-hug - a quick embrace before the doors open.

Castiel walks quickly as he leads Dean down the hall, as though he's afraid Dean will run again if he has too much time to think. Maybe he's right to.

Everything is sterile and white, though inside the nursery itself he can see cutesy pastel decorations on the wall. Castiel flashes some wristband and signs them in. A nurse leads them over to a large plastic box.

Dean looks down at his son - his tiny, dark-haired son. His eyes are shut tight and his fists are balled. He has a little blue cap on, and there's a small tube running up into his nose. He doesn't seem real at all, could be a doll if not for the slow rise and fall of his chest. The little card on the box reads, Baby Winchester.

"How is he?" Dean says, his voice light as he touches the side of the cot.

"Healthy," the nurse says. If she's at all unsure of why Dean is asking, she doesn't show it. "He's having trouble regulating his temperature, but the feeding tube is temporary. He'll be ready for a bottle soon enough. In terms of being premature, he's going remarkably well."

"Thank you," Castiel says softly. "You've taken remarkable care of him."

"We take remarkable care of all our babies," she says with a smile. She pats Castiel's shoulder before returning to her desk.

Dean's heart does something funny when he sees the way Castiel stares down at their son. A creature who has seen eons of time looks at their child as though he's the most amazing thing ever created.

"Let's get a place."

Castiel looks up. "We already live together."

"I mean just us. I don't care if we do it here or do it in Sioux Falls, but together. No roommates throwing parties or having threesomes on the living room couch."

Castiel smiles. It's like the passing a particularly heavy and dark cloud, a bright spot finally, after the difficulty of the last few months. "A fresh start, I gather?"

"Absolutely. A fresh start."


	11. Epilogue

**Epilogue**

Three AM feeding, right on the dot. "He's a better alarm clock than my phone," Dean mutters as he stumbles out of bed. Castiel continues snoring right into his pillow, covers pulled up nearly over his head.

Dean closes the bedroom door behind him, and turns down the hall toward the nursery. "It's too early," Dean says as he picks the baby up. After a couple of weeks he has this routine down to an art. Heat the bottle in hot water. Change the diaper. Remember to put clothes back on the baby. (Apparently that's important when it's cold out.)

While the bottle heats, Dean paces and rocks the baby to keep him calm. Castiel can usually sing him down, but his singing could calm a bear - low and deep hymns in a language Dean doesn't know.

"Hey there, Jim, let's be cool about this." When James wails harder, Dean forces himself to keep his voice calm. At first he freaked out when the baby freaked out, and it didn't take long to realize that wouldn't work.

"Are you not a Jim? Kirk would be appalled. Are you going to be one those super serious kids who always goes by James?" The chatting seems to sooth the baby, and the bottle is so close to being ready. "You can go by Jimmy if you want, but your daddy will find it a little uncomfortable. Fair warning. As long as you never seriously ask to go by Jimbo, we'll be alright."

With the bottle ready, Dean heads out into the living room and settles in the recliner. It's an old leather thing from Bobby's house, but it's comfortable and rocks well. James settles immediately once he's got a bottle in his mouth, and Dean smiles.

"Someday, your daddy and I will have all sorts of stories to tell you - when you're grown and ready for them. Not a second too early, because you deserve a childhood. I order you to have a childhood, do you understand?"

James slurps his bottle and stares at Dean with sleepy eyes.

"In fact, maybe never. Maybe you'll never need to know. Though I suppose someday you're going to want to know how you got stuck with _Inias_ as a middle name."

Once the bottle is done, he shifts James to burp him, carefully patting his back as he rocks the chair. This is good. This is tiring and hard, and maybe it a poignant reminder when Sam wasn't much older than James, but it's good.

"Someday, though, we'll definitely tell you about the people who matter. Maybe you don't need the details, but you ought to know who the Novaks are to you - maybe someday you'll meet Claire, who your daddy loves nearly as much as he loves you. You'll get to hear about your grandparents. When I was little, my mom used to sing to me and Uncle Sammy before bed. It's been thirty years, but I can still hear her voice."

Castiel's snores fill the apartment like a metronome.

Dean hums a lullaby.


End file.
